From The Ashes
by Ice Spectre
Summary: The story of the life of Maria Tachibana, and her spiral toward darkness before the intervention of some of the most important angels in her life. Complete novel, 20 Chapters.
1. 1: Her First Time

DISCLAIMER: SAKURA WARS/SAKURA TAISEN, MARIA TACHIBANA and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © SEGA 2006.

Rating: R for language, despite most of the foulest language being in Russian

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"**FROM THE ASHES" – Her First Time**

January 20th, 1921. The building is old, and it looks a bit like it's leaning where it stands at the triangular intersection of Bridge and Pearl, where they meet Broad. This close to the docks in Lower Manhattan, the building is full to bursting with immigrants, predominantly Irish, but all kinds are in this building, the poorest of the poor, the lowest of the low.

It's damned cold out here, and I shake the snow from the shoulders of my trench coat and have to remove my fedora to dust it off. My partner flicks me a glance, his cigarette still pinched in his lips, his match, as yet, unstruck.

"You wanna wait till we're outtada wind before ya try dat?" I ask him. Sometimes he's not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

Uptown, the wind seems restricted to the avenues, unable to get through the buildings much to hit the streets. But down here below the Grid, there is no safe place. We're only two streets from the Harbour. I can see Ellis Island from here if I look around the corner. But then, that's why this place is so full of immigrants. The streets paved with gold are a lie, and none of them can afford to get any further into the country than right here.

Cavaradossi strikes his match as the swinging wooden door bangs closed behind us. It's on a spring, but it doesn't fit into the jamb anymore, so it continues complaining against the wind all on its own. A woman has taken up residence on the stairs for what looks like a long time. A woven shawl wraps around her shoulders and around the baby in her arms. She is thin and petite, and looks Korean. She has that harried, spiritless look, like someone who's lost everything. She looks at us as if she doesn't really see us, not even the twinges of apprehension at two men dressed in what seem to be detective-like clothing.

I glance up the staircase past her. Honestly, I'm not sure it'll hold our weight. I'm fit for forty years old, but tall for the Kilkenny Mick I am. But Cavaradossi's… well, he's Italian. Just to mess with my head, the stairs creak threateningly as we ascend. And the apartment we're looking for is on the fifth floor.

I bang the side of my fist against door number 516.

"_Vali otsyuda_!" comes a sharp, low, female voice from inside. I have no idea what she said. But I do know it was Russian, and I know it was impolite. Cavaradossi, however, speaks enough Russian—albeit badly—to understand.

"Open up, Tachibana!" bellows Cavaradossi, playing 'bad cop.' We fit the parts well enough. "We still ain't seen no papers t'roo immigration, an' we ain't goin' away! ...till ya show us _proof._ If ya get my meanin'."

Cavaradossi is the picture of subtlty. In all fairness, the Kazuar has only been working for us for a few months, barely earning enough to keep her landlord from dumping her body in the Hudson. Not that her landlord would be able to pull off killing her. This kid's quick. The boss knew her from the war over in Russia. She's just lucky she was a good driver then, and knew how to drive a steam-powered automobile, or she would never have found any work here at all. Crazy, I think. Coming over here all on her own with nothing, a sixteen-year-old girl? It's asking to be a headline.

A couple of doors have opened and curious heads peek out. The rest are too smart to stick their noses out.

Her voice is closer this time, as if she'd strode up to the door and yelled through it. "_Ischezni, govnyuk!"_

"C'mon, Ruskie! Jus' open th' goddamn door an' we can straighten dis crud out, awright?"

In a defiant yank, the door opens just a few inches, the security chain holding it from opening any further. That's my cue. The instant it opens, I kick it and the chain rips out of the rotting wood of the door jamb. The door slams into the Kazuar's shoulder, throwing her to the floor inside the the tiny one-room apartment. We are inside before she can stand up, and I turn to close the door.

"_Nnh!_" I hear the grunt of pain from her and then the unmistakeable sound of heavy gunmetal clattering to wooden floorboards. I turn around and Cavaradossi has her right arm wrenched behind her back, and his left arm around her throat. She's more angry than in pain, but she can't move and she can't shoot us, so that's a good thing. Her Enfield is on the floor a few feet away from them both. Cav spits the remainder of his cigarette to the floor over her shoulder and steps on it, still holding her.

I start a search of the tiny apartment. One room. It's got a sink and a counter, and one gas burner that doesn't look like it's worked in years. One pantry cabinet will, I am certain, contain roaches rather than food. She doesn't have a bureau or a closet for someone to be hiding in. Her clothing, what little of it she owns, is all hung on hangers over the gas pipe that runs the length of the seven-foot ceiling. I could reach up and put both hands against the ceiling. So could she. But they grow them tall in Russia, too. The radiator is under the window, paint chipped and rusted, and doing little to warm the room. A desk with a military arm-lamp and an army green rolling chair stand in the darkest corner of the apartment. The window is cracked. There are no curtains, no one could be hiding behind those either. The fire escape has a chair on it, as if she uses it as a balcony. A three-drawer file cabinet stands next to her desk. On top of it is a framed photograph of a Russian soldier, and a candle. Too young to be her father, and doesn't resemble her enough to be her brother. Probably dead. Russian Orthodox is one wacked religion. I reach for the picture.

"_Nyet_!" she yells, struggling against Cavaradossi. She's been silent up until now. "_Ya adna!_"

"She says she's alone," Cavaradossi translates. So I don't bother invading any more of her privacy. Cavaradossi releases her neck and flings her by the wrist to the bed, where she lands with a huff of lost breath, sitting at the head.

"So. To business." I pull off my gloves and stuff them in the pockets of my beige trench. "Is he dead?"

She glares up at me with flashing green eyes, from under a curtain of disarrayed short blonde hair. She is massaging the wrist Cav had twisted. "_Da, myertvye." _

Cavaradossi yells at her again, making her jump in surprise. "_Ne svitsi!_"

She yells back, "_Mne nasrat' chto ty dumaesh', krutoj paren'!_"

"HEY!" I stop them before it comes to blows. Besides, it's beginning to piss me off that I can't understand them. "Quit wit' da Russian."

Cavaradossi gestures impatiently to the Kazuar. "You speak English? You know… Angleiski?"

She thinks for a minute. "Little," and she nods to confirm. She seems a bit subdued now. The defiance and affront were fading back into the automaton soldier we recognized. Can't blame her. I remember my first time. I was shaken for weeks. She better get over it fast, though. They're not going to give her weeks to recover, Valentinov already has big plans for her. She glances at the floor and whispers, "_Isvinitye_."

It sounds like an apology, so I treat it like one. "S'awright, kid," I reassure her and ruffle her hair, turning to look out the window so I do not see the furious reaction to the patronizing treatment I'd just made her endure. I stuff my hands in my pants pockets, curtaining back my trench. "Look, Cav's jus' a little… panicked, ya know? On accounta we was supposed ta tell da boss firs' t'ing dis mornin'."

"But…" she begins haltingly, her low voice thickly laden with a Ukrainian dialect. "You come… just now… only."

"You was supposta meet us down at da docks, doll," Cavaradossi smirks.

The Russian glares, evidently disliking both the accusation and the term of 'endearment.' "I go… where he say!" she points at me now. She's not lying, precisely. I told her to wait here for a messenger at 8:00am – who never came, and then meet us at the docks at ten. It's eleven now. "And wait… here! For…" she seeks a word, opening one hand as if she might find it in the air. "…messenger."

"MESSENGER!" Cav thinks she meant him. Messenger is the lowest rank you can possibly have in the Mafia and still be considered part of it. He draws himself up to his full height, his face red with outrage. The Kazuar smiles, pleased that she's managed to insult him, and in English, too. "Ya got ANY idea how long I been workin' for Valentinov? YOU's da lucky one, gettin' in as a driver, ya skipped all dat crud, but ME! I worked for every step, blondie!" He jabs a finger at her, accusingly. She doesn't like the implications, but is used to them by now. She knew Valentinov in the Russian Revolution, and so the rumours of just how she was rising so quickly through the ranks were rife. And from what I could tell, completely untrue.

Cav looks a little murderous, but the Kazuar doesn't look scared. Regardless, I say his name softly, as if to remind him not to kill our newest, best, and most expendable hit man. Or, hit woman, if a seventeen year old kid could be considered a woman.

Cav sits on the only chair in the apartment with a flop, making the old army issue chair creak and roll a few inches. He takes a few deep breaths to calm himself down. The Kazuar has the good grace not to chuckle, and has, admirably, wiped the self-satisfied smirk off her face, returning to the icy, stony, impassive expression that became her trademark, hiding the explosive fury inside. This is to her credit, good survival instincts. She stays where she's been flung, sitting at the head of her iron rail bed. There's nowhere else to sit in this joint, so I'm pacing. She glances only once at her gun, in the middle of the floor. None of us make a move for it, it's kind of a mutual respect thing.

I find myself back at the file cabinet. For some reason, I'm staring at this jake's picture again. He's got tinted glasses on, protection against snow blindness and rifle flare. The candlewax is melted so far away that it doesn't look like it'll burn again. My curiosity begins to obscure my purpose.

I shake my head and remember why I'm here. The record book. Bianni's ring. His file. And the Kazuar's money. If this went off without a hitch, she could pack up this joint now and move to a better one.

I grab the handle of the top file drawer and pull. It doesn't open.

"File's in here? You gotta key?" I ask her.

She shakes her head, juts her chin indicatively at the file cabinet. "Is break."

"It don' open?"

"_Nyet._"

"What the hell you keepin' it for, den, posterity?"

She's got that smirk again, the one that always serves to remind me that I might outrank her, but she's got skills I could never dream of. "Is having… two more…" she gestures to the cabinet, having given up on finding the word 'drawers.'

I roll my eyes at the insubordination. She's mocking me on purpose, but she always does. If the boss wouldn't kill me for it, I'd kill her. She's more annoying than she's worth. "Jeezis. Which drawer."

"Drawer," she repeats, like I've just solved the Russian-to-English puzzle she's been working on since she last spoke. "Two," she holds up two fingers.

Right, the middle one. I pull it open. The first file is marked 'Bianni.' It's got a thin red leather book in it, and a bulky envelope that probably contains his ring, and the papers of his information. He'd been skimming off the top of Valentinov's operation for almost a decade, long before Valentinov 'inherited' it just over a year ago. Now they'd be skimming HIM off the top of the Hudson.

"No one saw ya?"

Slowly, she shakes her head, and I can tell she's resisting the urge to be offended by the question.

"Where's the body?" I ask her.

Her glare sharpens. "You do nyet worry," she says slowly, "about that."

I drop the file into my soft leather briefcase and grin at her. Good instincts again. "Ya done good, kid. But jeezis…" I hold up an empty bottle of Stolichnaya that I know Valentinov had only given her two days ago. "Ease up. Ya look like shit."

I reach to pick up her gun, and she's on her feet in an instant, and Cav's gun is pressed against her head, her hand is around my wrist, my fingers just an inch from the barrel of her revolver.

"_HOLD IT!_" Cav yells and we all freeze. Slowly, I pick up her gun by the barrel and offer it to her, handle first.

"Congratulations, kid. You're gonna getcherself promoted."

She seems unimpressed. She's got both hands around the handle, her finger on the trigger, aiming straight between my eyes. "Money…" she reminds me. "Now." She's shaking. She's hung over. She's never killed anyone in cold blood before last night. She hasn't slept, of that I'm sure.

Cav drops his briefcase by her feet, his gun still trained on her head, and hers still on mine. I jut my chin at the case. "There. Now put the goddamn gun down before Cav ruins your pretty hair."

Slowly, they both lower their guns. The Kazuar picks up the case and opens it on the bed. I cannot see her face as she sees the bills stacked inside. "Getcherself outta this dump, kid," I advise her. "And getcherself cleaned up before tonight."

She turns to look at me, her full expression changed to one far less intimidating, one that would almost convince me she wasn't capable of murder, if I didn't know better. "Tonight?"

"Yeah. Seven o'clock. Luna's up in Little Italy." This is the only part of town where Nolita could be considered 'up.' "And come sober."

I close the door solidly behind us, leaving the Kazuar alone to continue resolving herself to her new life.

* * *

_**Russian Translations: **_

_Vali otsyuda _– "Get lost!"

_Ischezni, govnyuk! _– "Beat it, you bastard!"

_Nyet! Ya adna!_ – "No! I'm alone!"

_Da, myertvye._ – "Yes, dead."

_Ne svisti! _– "I think you lie!"

_Mne nasrat' chto ty dumaesh', krutoj paren'!_ – I don't give a shit what you think, tough guy!

_Angleiski _– English

_Isvinitye_ – I'm sorry.


	2. 2: I Have Squandered My Resistance

Disclaimer: SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © SEGA 2004. ; AMERICAN TUNE, THE BOXER TM & © Simon & Garfunkel. Actual historical mafia members have been used for reference, their names scrambled, in the following story.

Rating: PG-13 for language and minimal violence.

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"**FROM THE ASHES" – I Have Squandered My Resistance**

"_Many's the time I've been mistaken, and many times confused. _

_Yes, and I've often felt forsaken, and certainly misused. _

_Ah, but I'm all right, I'm all right, I'm just weary to my bones. _

_Still, you don't expect to be bright and 'bon vivant,' so far away from home, so far away from home…" _

Maria listened to the footsteps fading on the creaking staircase, and when she could hear them no longer, she let her guard down. She was standing at the door, both palms against it as if to keep it closed. She'd nearly reached up to chain the door when she realized the chain's anchor had been ripped from the wall. She locked the doorknob instead, cursory gesture though it might have been.

Water that smelled mildly brackish and a little metallic ran from the lead pipes into her sink, and did little more to help remove the smell of sulfur and gunpowder from her memory. It was long gone from her hands.

It had not been the first time she had killed someone. But war was different. In the Revolution, she was a hero. The people she and her captain and her comrades were firing upon were not really people, after all. The enemy was somehow… sub-sentient… in the eyes of the Russians. She wasn't a killer in the Revolution. She was a soldier. A hero. A servant of freedom and of her country. She hadn't committed a crime, she'd committed a great sacrifice, an undertaking of which to be proud.

And yet, the act was the same. One bullet, one death, caused by her. Did the reason for the act justify it?

She half sat, half collapsed onto her bed, all the stiffness leaving her. The suitcase beside her contained her ticket to a better life. To what great depths she'd fallen over the past months. From soldier and hero to coward, defeated and fleeing, sheltered by a fellow escapee of the ambush named Valentinov. He knew a world where they would be safe, he and four other survivors of the fateful morning. New York, where a cousin was helping build Valentinov an empire of his own, and had been doing so for a decade beforehand.

Most of the machinations of the mafia escaped Maria completely, at least for the first months of her employ. So little of her waking hours were spent sober, or unmired in grief and agony. She'd watched the man she loved fall. He'd told her to wait, back over the bluff, where it was safe. Snow fuzzied the landscape and blurred the air as a small contingent marched forward, a light wind ruffling the fur of their collars and hats. It had been moments of silence only before Maria heard the call for a retreat. He was only metres from her when he was shot in the back. In the back.

Maria remembered seeing his tinted glasses land lightly in the snow, remembered his rifle falling on top of them, shattering a lens, and oddly, this was of great concern to her – for his glasses were valuable and necessary… She did not dare consider that he would never need them again.

She'd stood at his grave the way she'd stood at her father's grave only a few years earlier. She'd been fourteen years old when a voice made her drop the roses she'd brought to lay on her father's grave. He'd offered her not revenge, but a way to carry on the cause for which her father had given his life. She had no family now, nothing left to lose. And she was safe, protected, guided and loved under the mentoring and in the arms of her captain.

Her head throbbed and she put a damp hand to her forehead. Vodka was a valuable ally and a bitter enemy. She was just tired, was all. Perhaps if she could just sleep until the evening, she might recover her wits and her composure. Russia was gone. And New York, after a little packing, would be far less hostile.

"_And I don't own a soul that's not been battered, _

_I don't have a friend who feels at ease. _

_I don't have a dream that's not been shattered or driven to its knees. _

_But it's all right, it's all right, for we lived so well, so long. _

_Still, when I think of the road we were traveling on, I wonder what's gone wrong, _

_I can't help but wonder how it's gone wrong."_

By late afternoon, everything she owned was packed in two boxes and a duffel bag. The metal frame of a bed looked worse for the lack of blankets, its blue striped mattress lumpy and yellowing. She stood at the window, but was looking instead at the framed photograph in her hands.

They were supposed to have been heroes. They were supposed to be a great light in dark times, leaders of the poor and downtrodden, saviours of those unable to defend themselves. They were compatriots, bound in blood and spirit. Now they were all gone. Everyone who knew her, loved her, understood her. Everyone was gone.

She had imagined that they'd win, that peace would reign and Russia would prosper. She had dared to hope that they would lay aside their rifles one day, perhaps in the same case. Perhaps she would become his wife one day. And perhaps her children would be three-quarters Russian. Perhaps they would have a cherry wood bed and a quilt with blue calico patterns. They were simple hopes, but they sustained her when water seeped through the stained fabric of her tent roof, when the down of her sleeping bag was not enough to keep her warm, and when sleep refused to come to her for the terrified and alert prick of her ears to every small sound. A raccoon could be an enemy spy, the wind could as easily russle the tree branches as it could the cloak of an assassin.

She would nightly promise herself that if she could only be strong for one more day, then everything would be over, victory would be assured, and her dream would come true. Somehow, everything fell apart and slipped through her fingers. Every last bit.

"_And I dreamed I was dying. _

_I dreamed that my soul rose unexpectedly, and looking back down at me, smiled reassuringly. _

_And I dreamed I was flying. _

_High up above my eyes could clearly see the Statue of Liberty sailing away to sea. _

_And I dreamed I was flying."_

From the roof of her apartment building, one could see Ellis Island. But Maria's old window only had a view of the neighbouring building's crumbling brick wall. She would not miss it.

Her landlord was not in. She put the key and seven dollars (one month's rent) in an envelope and slipped it under his door. The rent had been due the day before yesterday, and she'd been given her notice of eviction yesterday. She could have kept the seven dollars, but she did not wish to leave thinking she'd been thrown out. Even if the only one who would know or care was herself.

The steam-powered automobile idling in the street contained her belongings. She could now afford a taxi ride, and knew exactly to where she was going. Valentinov had been setting the place up for her for months. On the third floor above a bar and restaurant in Little Italy, run by the family for whom Maria and Valentinov worked.

She paused in the street, her hand on the suicide door of the Stanley and her foot on the rail step. From here, she could see Ellis Island.

She'd been travelling for months when she finally reached that island. Weeks and weeks on trains, then three weeks on a boat, and then land again at last. A tiny little dot of an island off the shore of New York, swarmed with people not of American descent.

"What kind of name is Mapra?" asked a befuddled Immigration officer, looking over Maria's papers. Knowing precious little English, Maria attempted to explain the Cyrillic alphabet, but failed. Her name, likely more accurately spelled "Marya," became Maria, more often than not with the accent on the second syllable instead of the proper first. A haphazard anglicization was performed on her surname, and Maria Tachibana believed she would now be brought by ferry to New York.

Instead, she was detained, and subjected to a battery of tests, including literacy, which she failed miserably. She was tired of answering questions, tired of being stuck with needles, tired of having her eyes and ears and nose and throat examined. More than that, she was tired of her suitcase, tired of a sea of incomprehensible strangers, tired of the overwhelming sense of poverty, hopelessness and sorrow that surrounded her in close quarters, in silence perforated by soft whispers and muffled coughs. Hope waned, and Valentinov was nowhere to be seen in the five days she was held on Ellis Island. She became certain she'd be sent back to Russia.

On the morning of the sixth day, Valentinov came. Within an hour she was on the ferry and headed to America. The island, and beyond it, France's statue, diminished in the distance. The wind at the bow of the ferry was strong, and it made her feel elated. Freedom. A new world. And a new life.

"You gettin' in or what?" the driver asked, thumping his palm against the outside of the door where he leaned out to gain her attention.

"_Ah-- da. Spasi—_" Maria paused and switched to English. "Yes. Thank you. I am sorry." And she got into the car, once again bidding farewell to everything she left in her wake.

"_But we come on a ship they called Mayflower, _

_we come on a ship that sailed the moon. _

_We come in the ages' most uncertain hour and sing an American tune. _

_And it's all right, oh it's all right, it's all right, you can't be forever blessed. _

_Still tomorrow's going to be another working day, and I'm trying to get some rest, that's all I'm trying, to get some rest."_

The fist banging against the door came all too soon, and Maria sat bolt upright in bed. She had not unpacked a thing, but just laid down to catch her breath for a moment, and fell asleep. She was cold, she realized, and had pulled her long black wool coat over her for warmth in her sleep. She cast it off and stood, squinting blearily.

"Who knocks?" she asked in a gravelly, sleep-laden voice.

"Maria, it's me, Joseph. Hey, you got a half an hour till the boss wants to see ya downstairs," Joseph spoke kindly. He was not much older than Maria. His family had been in New York for thirty years now, and Joseph was the first of his family not to be born in Italy. He was a nephew in the family for whom she worked, and by far was the kindest.

"_Bal'shoye spasibe…_" she whispered in extreme gratitude and turned the deadbolt to allow him inside.

He lingered politely near the door, one hand in his coat pocket, the other holding his hat. He glanced around a bit. Maria's new apartment was still one room, but nearly three times the size of the old one. It had a full stove and an oven, the bed was double and wooden, the electric lights operated on switches and had beveled glass covers to diffuse the brilliance. An ice box stood in one corner, and she had two windows, both facing west, which had a view of the street, rather than a brick wall. "Do you like the new flat?"

Joseph had a way of asking Maria questions that made her feel as if she were a little girl. She often had to consider how to answer in order to dispell that image. "Fewer roaches," she stated, as if that were the only immediately visible benefit.

Joseph chuckled. "Yeah, I bet. Look, Maria," he said, mispronouncing her name, "I wanted to warn ya. Because you don't look so good after last night, and unlike my uncle, I actually care about that."

Maria narrowed her eyes at him, scrutinizingly. She folded her arms and leaned back against a wall, her lips thinning slightly.

"They were impressed by your… efficiency as a bouncer."

She huffed a mirthless laugh and shook her head. "Bouncer… This man… was not drunk… in bar downstairs… was not… bothering Valentinov or Ignazio."

"Well. He _was_ bothering Uncle Giuseppe. Now he's not. They thought it was some good work. That's why the money was a little better than you'd thought at first. A whole year's pay for someone like you. Six hundred dollars."

Maria's eyebrows shot up at the words "someone like you." She knew what he meant, and was a little affronted that the only difference between him and her was that he relocated to America in his mother's womb. She did it all by herself. But his statement was true enough. No immigrant could earn more than six hundred a year these days.

"They have another job for you," Joseph Ignazio got to the point. "A big one. Umberto Lupo."

"_Lupo!_" she stood up again, as startled as when she'd first woken.

"Yeah. React like that now, and get it out of your system. Downstairs in a half hour, be cool as ice about it, got me? The job pays fifteen hundred. Yes, dollars." Joseph put a hand on her shoulder, but Maria didn't react. Her jaw hung agape, her gaze distant, lowered. "Hang in there, kid. You'll be fine."

And then Joseph was gone.

* * *

_**Russian Translations**_: 

"_Ah-- da. Spasi—_" – Ah, yes. Thank y—

"_Bal'shoye spasibe…_" – Great thanks…


	3. 3: From the Land of Ice and Snow

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © SEGA 2004. Actual historical mafia members have been used for reference, their names scrambled, in the following story. Luna's Restaurant at 112 Mulberry Street in NYC has NO Mafia connections known to this author. It was founded by Neapolitan Mama Luna in 1919, though.

Credit to IGN for the review of the Sakura Taisen game characters, I stole from their quote, **_"We are fond of Maria Tachibana, as she is obviously a freakin' thug."_**

Rating: PG-13, Language, Violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – From the Land of Ice and Snow**

"Quit complaining, Cav, it ain't that cold." I am sick of the cold, too, but I'm sicker of Cav's whining.

"Yeah, easy fuh YOU ta say, YOU dinnit forget yer hat." Cavaradossi's head is ducked against the now driving snow that seems to be coming straight down Mulberry Street, horizontally. His thinning hair is doing little to keep the heat in. "Leas' we coulda done was jump in a Stanley."

"Fuggedabout it, it's…" I gesture, frustrated, down Mulberry. "Two damn blocks!"

"Awww… _shit!_" Cav curses and stops walking.

I'm halfway across Broome Street, and I stop and turn around. I shouldn't laugh. I can't help it.

"What the hell ya think is so funny, ya goddamn mick?" Cav is scraping off the bottom of his shoe against the stone curb. The horse and carriage had gone by a while back, and snow had cooled and covered the horse's leftovers. Cav found them. I'm still trying to stop laughing.

"Izzat the cleverest insult ya can come up wit', Cav? Geezis… I mean, my las' name ain't even start wit' a Mc. You gonna call me an O?"

"Yeah. Mebbe I will. You call me Cav."

"That's on account a your name is too damn long." Cav catches up and the snow and slush take care of cleaning off the rest of his shoe.

We cross Grand and Hester and come to the door of Luna's, a restaurant with apartments above it, on the east side of Mulberry. I yank open the door and gesture for Cav to go first.

"Mama!" Cav yells as he goes inside, his arms flung open wide. I follow him in and pull the door closed behind me. It is almost painfully hot in here compared to the street – my cheeks and nose are burning. I take off my hat and scarf. The smell of garlic, tomatos and oregano is fantastic, and I remember that I'm starving. If there's one thing the Italians know that the Irish never did, it's spices.

"_Ahhhh, buona sera, mio piccino! Come sta?_" 'Mama' is not Cavaradossi's mother. We all call her Mama anyway. She's a little Neapolitan woman who opened this restaurant less than two years ago, along with her sons – and to be honest, I have no idea how many of them she has. I know it's more than three, and less than a hundred. Though probably not much less. Mama is short and rather slim – and hearing her call Cav her 'little one' is amusing.

"_Sta molto bene, grazie, _Mama_, grazie,_" Cav puts the little woman down out of an incredible embrace. Little old women in Italy, I assume, are as unbreakable and ironclad as little old women in Ireland. Mama is unruffled, and fusses about how we must be starved.

"Vincenzo!" Mama bellows, scaring no one. The only ones in her restaurant at the moment are 'family.' A lanky, olive-skinned young man in a pristine apron ducks out of the kitchen with _three_ glasses of wine in _each_ hand, the stems between his fingers. I'm a little amazed. "_Il mio figlio!_" she proudly introduces him to the gathered. Everyone here is Italian or understands Italian except me, so I'm trying to keep up with what's going on. Sometimes I feel a little left out, coming from a country that was conquered by England so long ago that Gaelic is all but dead. I assume that's her son."_E la prima volta che visita gli Stati Uni_!"

Vincenzo sets the wine glasses down around the table. One each for the three who were already there, one each for Cav and myself, and one more.

I realize now that she's not here. I glance over at the restaurant door just as she appears in it. The apartments upstairs have a door just beside the restaurant. It is only a couple of metres from her door to the restaurant door. That is the only reason I can imagine why she's not wearing a coat or hat. But she is wearing gloves. At least, she's wearing one on the hand that is not in her pants pocket, the one that pulls open the door.

Winter seems to come inside with her. The snow in her hair is not melting. Her cheeks and nose are not red from the cold. She is as pale as winter itself, and she is not shivering. The gust of icy wind that rushes around her as she steps inside lifts two white linen tablecloths, and one overturns a lit candle. Vincenzo hurriedly rights it before it can start a fire.

The Celt blood in me is tempted to gesture a quick ward against evil spirits, despite how ridiculous my people's superstitions can get. Something about that girl just isn't right. She was easier to deal with four months ago, but when winter came… ever since then, I get the distinct feeling that it's cold in New York because she told it to be. Despite the fact that it's cold in New York _every_ winter.

"_Ohime! C'e il vento e nevica! Fa freddo, _Kazuar,_ ed il portello è chiuso!"_ Mama rushes over to the Kazuar and takes the much taller girl by the arm, dragging her inside as if to save her from freezing. Mama's a bit late for that, the Russian froze over years ago. "_Voi state congelando! Qui, qui. Ciò li scalderà_." Mama gestured to the seat and the dark red wine.

The Kazuar allows herself to be lead to the chair, her expression impassive. I can't read her, as usual. She looks much better than she did this morning, though. Seems she even got herself a new blazer. Pin stripes suit her well. Though it looks a little like an attempt to seem more like one of the family – which, in all likelihood, it is. Now all she needs are white spats and to take out her revolver, and voila: a freakin' thug.

Directly across the table from the only remaining empty seat is Valentinov. He lifts his wine glass slightly as a toast to his comrade, and she takes her seat. Mama tries again to get her to drink the wine, but the Kazuar slowly turns her frozen gaze to the woman. I can't read it, but Mama apparently can. It is not icy hatred or seething emotionlessness. Mama's reaction tells me everything. It is a plea, something below the surface of the ice, begging to be left alone, begging not to be shown warmth, lest the ice melt. Mama's expression is not one of affront, it is pity and sorrow. She brushes back the Kazuar's blonde hair in an astoundingly motherly gesture, and places a hand against the girl's cold cheek. Then she turns and goes. The Kazuar's fingers are gripped like iron around the arm of the wooden chair, attempting to maintain control after Mama's departure. When she turns back to Valentinov, the ice is healed and refrozen completely.

The table is a rectangle. At the head, Giuseppe Ignazio, the big boss. At the foot, his nephew Joseph. The Kazuar is sitting next to me on one side of the table. Cav is across from me, and Valentinov is across from her. My mind might be playing tricks on me, but it's colder on my right side, where she is.

"Kazuar._ Il nostro assassino piccolo. Buono_." Giuseppe holds out his hand to her, warmly. He is smiling his trademark smile, the one that means everything and nothing.

She responds to him as only she and Valentinov do, it seems – the proper intent, but a bit of a Slavic touch. She takes his hand in both of hers and kisses it, silently and automatically, and with no smile in return. _"Spasibe, gaspadin."_

Joseph intervenes on my – and likely his own – behalf. "The Kazuar doesn't speak much Italian. And most of us speak no Russian. English, please."

Giuseppe's smile broadens. "We have a job for you… Kazuar."

Her expression doesn't change. She doesn't nod or prompt him or speak. She simply continues to wait. Her leather-gloved fingers are laced together on the table, and she regards him, sideward, placidly.

After a couple of moments, Giuseppe's affability fades just a little. He'd expected some reaction from her. "Do you not want to know what it is?"

"Will be difficult," the Kazuar begins in broken English, "to do job… if you do nyet tell what it is."

Valentinov reacts in irritation, hissing at her. "_Astarozhna, nimnoga suka!"_

Now the Kazuar's eyes flash slightly in anger and she turns to Valentinov. "_Shto vy skazali?"_

"_Nichivo,_" Valentinov is calmed by a powerful elbow from Cavaradossi, and falls silent again.

"Kazuar. Do you want the job or not?" Giuseppe interrupts the little Russian spat. This is a trick question. She doesn't have a choice. Well, she does, but to say no is to ask for death.

"Who?" she asks, instead of answering him. She wastes no time on pleasantries, does not try to appeal to the boss, she treads a very thin line between being valuable enough to preserve and willful enough to destroy.

"Silvio. Lupo's bodyguard."

The Kazuar flicks a glance at Joseph, who meets her gaze, and then looks away again. I have no idea what that little exchange is about.

"Lead time." She prompts Giuseppe again.

"You have one month."

"Three," she demands. I can see the boss steam a little.

"Two," he concedes, but she does not give in.

"I need three."

In one swift movement, Giuseppe's chair crashes to the floor behind him as he rises, and backhands her across the face, solidly. She grabs the table with her right hand and the chair arm with her left to keep from falling over. I grab the arm of her chair too, because she's about to land on me. The chair only tipped a little, and I manage to set it back on all fours for her. She does not turn back to the boss yet. She's staring at the floor between our chairs, holding on to the table.

"_Vy s uma sashli? Khvatit…" _Valentinov whispers to her.

She releases her grip on the table and drags the back of her right hand across her mouth. It comes away slightly bloody. Her hair is curtaining her face. She stays there for the space of two breaths, then sits up straight again, as composed and placid as before. The only difference is a red mark on her right cheekbone, and a small spot of blood at the corner of her mouth.

"All right. Two months," she whispers.

Mama puts a glass of water in front of the girl, silently, and slips away. I toss her a smile as she goes. Giuseppe is detailing more information for our bouncer-turned-assassin and I'm only half listening as I turn back around. The Kazuar has closed a hand around the glass of water, but she hasn't picked it up to drink it yet. I look at her face. She'll be fine, she just needs to learn her place. Then I realize that it doesn't just _seem_ colder on my right side… it _is_ colder on my right side. I look back at the glass.

It's frosted. Around her fingers. It's frosted. Like… it wasn't frosted before, and now it is… just where she's touching it. The water wasn't cold. And it wasn't hot. It was just water. In a room temperature glass. And that is NOT fogged glass. It is FROSTED. Right through the leather gloves…!

I kick Cav under the table.

"Ow! What's a mattuh fuh you?" Cav ain't subtle, like I've mentioned before.

Valentinov notices. He reaches across the table in a gesture as if to take the Kazuar's hands, and 'accidentally' knocks the glass to the floor, where it spills and shatters.

"_Bozhe moy! Isvinitye!"_ Valentinov makes an attempt at appearing apologetic and sheepish. He is not looking at the Kazuar, but she is gripping his hand hard enough to make the leather of her glove creak, and he, in defense of his fingers, is gripping back – hard. "_Maria, zakuritye?"_ he asks her something with a head-jerk toward the back door, and then explains to us. "Will take her outside to…" here he makes a dusting gesture on his clothing to represent a verb he can't think of, "…off the glass from her… and to take smoke."

"Five minutes," Giuseppe grants it to them, and Valentinov drags his girl outside, grabbing his coat as he goes. Well, well. It isn't being accustomed to Russia that makes this girl innured to the cold. I look at the glass on the floor as Vincenzo comes out with a wet rag to pick up glass shards.

It looks like normal broken glass. Wet, certainly, but not frozen.

I SWEAR it was frozen. I know what I saw. Her hand… FROZE… the glass. She's ice cold. Not just figuratively, literally. I know it. She's cursed. Or… possessed. Or she's a demon. Or an angel…

Just in case, I cross myself.

* * *

Italian Glossary: 

"_Ahhhh, buona sera, mio piccino! Come sta?_" – Ahhh, good evening, my little one! How are you?

"_Sta molto bene, grazie, _Mama_, grazie,_" – I'm very well, thank you, Mama, thank you.

"_Il mio figlio!_" – My son!

"_E la prima volta che visita gli Stati Uni_!" – It is his first visit to the United States!

"_Ohime! C'e il vento e nevica! Fa freddo, _Kazuar,_ ed il portello è chiuso!"_ – Oh my! It's windy and snowy! It's cold, Kazuar, and the door is closed!

"_Voi state congelando! Qui, qui. Ciò li scalderà_." – You are freezing! Here, here. This will warm you up.

"Kazuar._ Il nostro assassino piccolo. Buono_." - Kazuar, our little assassin. Well done.

Russian Glossary:

"_Spasibe, gaspadin_." – Thank you, sir.

"_Astarozhna, nimnoga suka!"_ – Watch it, little bitch.

"_Shto vy skazali?"_ – What did you say?

"_Nichivo,_" – Never mind.

"_Vy s uma sashli? Khvatit…"_ – Are you crazy? That's enough…

"_Bozhe moy! Isvinitye!"_ – Oh my god! I'm sorry!

"_Maria, zakuritye?"_ – Maria, cigarette?


	4. 4: I Love You To Death

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © SEGA 2004.

Rating: PG-13, Language, Violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – I Love You to Death**

Valentinov dragged Maria out the back door by the upper arm. He whispered to her in Russian, "_Shto s vami?"_ and she responded, "_Ya nye znayu…_" and the door closed behind them.

The alley was cold but still and empty. The blacktop ground was uneven, and slushy puddles caught freezing drops from awnings, fire escapes and pipes on the tall buildings all around.

A cat fled from the small stand of metal garbage cans outside the door on the other side of the alley, and then the alley was silent. Valentinov stripped off Maria's gloves, and she cringed, pulling her hands away.

He continued softly in Russian, to ensure their privacy. "How long has this been going on?"

"I-I… I don't know… I don't know what happened…"

Valentinov held out his hands, open and palm up. Maria hestitated. "Maria… I have seen your hands before."

One deep breath and then she thrust her hands at him, boldly. He regarded them before touching her. Her hands were strong, her fingers long. Her fingernails were kept short and natural. There was no reason to decorate what would never be seen. Her left hand was unmarked. But her right hand was rather lividly torn by a bullet, beginning where it grazed the back of her hand near the wrist and tore through the flesh between her thumb and index finger. The field surgeon had called it a miracle, three bullets had struck her, and NONE had struck bone. The muscles and tendons that moved her right thumb, though, were torn through. Her right thigh, just above the knee, was the location of the second bullet. That one had to be pulled out of her. The third grazed her right side, but did nothing more than superficial scraping. Her right hand had taken the worst damage.

Valentinov remembered watching her learn to shoot a pistol in Russia after the ambush, and wondered why. A rifle was so much less strain on the muscles she'd damaged. She had no target, just a British revolver she picked up somewhere… who knew how… and a big old tree. He watched her stand in the field of snow, stitched up just a week earlier, and draw slow, careful breaths to brace herself. She squeezed the trigger slowly, learning the feel of exactly where in the action the hammer clicked. And when it did, the gun kicked a little in her right fist, and she gritted her teeth around the pain. She couldn't cock the pistol with her right thumb. Panting and calming her breathing, she lowered the gun to cock the hammer back again with her left hand. Then she lifted and aimed. She braced herself and fired again, choking on the pain, this time. He almost went to her to stop her, but remembered trying to do so several days earlier and ending up staring down the business end of her revolver. A third shot and she cried out in pain, falling to her knees and gripping her right hand, her gun in the snow in front of her. Her light brown wool gloves were staining rust red with her blood.

Something about her stubborn persistence aroused the same old conflicting emotions in him that he'd always harboured for her. Somehow, the same attributes in Maria both enthralled him and drove him to fury. She was fascinating and infuriating. She seemed almost other-worldly at times, and then an instant later, something reminded him that she was just a girl, and a willful, difficult, irritating one at that. And most enraging of all, she was perpetually just outside of his reach.

Two days after she'd torn her stitches, she was on the field again, with red leather gloves on.

Valentinov took her hands in his. Her right hand was ice cold, the scars standing out lividly against her pale skin. Maria glanced aside, an almost angry humiliation staining her cheeks.

"Maria… please. Tell me. What is happening to you?"

She sighed and leaned back against the bricks, folding her arms. "I truly do not know, Major. It happens, little strange things like this, with ice. All throughout my adolescence. But very little. Only once did something… dramatic happen. I was seven years old, and it was October. My father took me to the lake where some children were ice skating. I had my own pair of skates, but Father did not have any. So he stood on the shore and watched, cheering whenever I would show him some trick, and laughing with me whenever I would fall down."

Maria paused and lowered her gaze, and then her voice.

"But it was October, not January… and the ice in some places was rather thin. I was close to the opposite shore when the ice broke under me, and my foot went through. Then it broke further and I fell in."

Valentinov listened, his expression stony and his jaw clenched. Maria continued.

"I was holding on to the edge of the ice where it had not shattered yet, yelling for Father. Father was yelling back for me to hold on as he ran around the lake to the nearest shore, looking for a branch or something for me to grab onto. Several of the other older children went to help, too, because I remember there were three of them who finally pulled me out."

When Maria paused, Valentinov's brows were lowered in confusion. Nothing was extraordinary about her story so far, people fall through the ice all the time. Most survive.

"The hole I'd made by falling through was perhaps only a metre wide. As I was holding on, the cracking ice under my arms was… no longer cracked. It felt thicker and stronger. And the hole I'd fallen through was… smaller. Major… the ice was closing up around me."

"Sometimes that can happen… can it not? If there is a very cold spot, ice can begin to reform, even while your body heat is waning?"

"I was thrashing, Major. And I was only in the water for a few minutes, there was not enough time for what was about to happen."

Valentinov lit a cigarette, and offered one to Maria, who refused, pulling her gloves back on as she continued.

"The branch they found could easily reach me. I was panicking now, I had noticed the ice closing on me. Pulling me back out of the hole was a very tight fit. And when I was able to get my knee up on the ice, I pulled myself almost completely free… except for my right foot. The ice closed around my foot and held. The laces were under the ice. I could not pull free."

"The lake froze up ON you?" Valentinov crossed himself.

"And, it was strong enough for Father to walk out on the ice to me, and beat at the ice around my foot with a stone to help free it. Another boy came to help, too. By the time we had my foot free, I had to leave my right ice skate - and both my mittens - frozen into the surface of the lake."

"My god…" Valentinov looked more frightened of the girl than concerned for her. But Maria had grown accustomed to Valentinov's strange demeanour. Ever since they'd met in the regiment, he'd been moody, evasive and seemed in turns to either care deeply for her or hate her. There were times when she saw love in his eyes so deep it scared her, and moments later, hatred so profound that she feared for her life. After several years, though, she simply learned to accept it as the way Valentinov was. Once or twice since their captain's death, Valentinov had come near to expressing some sort of sentiment to Maria, and she suspected for a brief time that he loved her. When she was suspicious of this, she would keep her distance from him, not wishing to be touched, and brooding over the silver locket she wore containing their captain's picture. In recompense, Valentinov's spite was so dire that Maria was able to convince herself that she was imagining any sentiment from him. In this way, she managed not to notice at all his growing obsession with her.

Maria shrugged, growing uncomfortable with Valentinov's stricken silence. "So. That is the only incident where it was extreme. The glass, it… I do not know. It has only been happening a little bit, recently. Only just a little."

Valentinov blew smoke aside and focused on the smouldering tip of his cigarette between his fingers. "Is that why you are afraid to swim?"

Maria gritted her teeth and nodded, disliking being accused of being 'afraid' of anything at all.

"Can you control it?"

Maria shook her head slowly. She didn't even know how it was happening, how could she stop it or harness it?

Patrick O'Rourke opened the alley door and stuck his head out. "Floor's clean. You, uh… You okay, kid?" He looked at Maria with new eyes, almost as if a little wary and suspicious of her. This was precisely what Maria hoped, her entire life, to avoid. The last thing she wanted to be known as was a freak.

She nodded and returned to broken English. "Yes. Thank you." Maria didn't like the way the Irishman looked at her, even before this incident. As if he was trying to read her. And she was quite aware of the rumours that she was Valentinov's lover. She suspected that they'd begun with Valentinov at one time, but now she was less certain. The Irishman, as far as she could tell, was one of the very few who did not seem to believe it.

In that much, his assumptions about her were correct. She may be rising quickly through the ranks because Valentinov favoured her, but his affection for her was completely unrequited.

No one had any idea where the Irishman got his brass to ask the next question. "That… uh… That glass. You know, I… I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure I saw it… I saw it start to freeze. Did it?"

Maria's glare was almost as cold as the winter. Valentinov reacted instead, throwing his head back and laughing. "Do _nyet_ be ridiculous, O'Rourke! Kazuar is good assassin, _da_, but… she is _nyet_ witch!"

Maria glanced at Valentinov. He may have said otherwise, but he really did believe she was a witch. An evil sorceress who had somehow put him under a spell to which he alternately gave in, and angrily fought. His obsession with her was entirely blamed on her.

He gestured for her to proceed him back inside.

* * *

Russian Glossary: 

"_Shto s vami?"_ – What's the matter with you?

"_Ya nye znayu…"_ – I don't know…


	5. 5: And Miles To Go Before I Sleep

Disclaimer & Legal Stuff: SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13, Violence, Language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – And Miles ****To**** Go Before I Sleep**

"I ain't sayin', I'm just sayin', is all." That made absolutely no sense, but very little of what I've seen happen today makes sense at all.

Cav is sitting next to me in a Stanley Steamer back seat, he convinced me to rent one on the way back uptown. I don't feel like shivering. I am already shivering enough.

I stare out the window in silence. The streets are quieter than usual. Not empty, never empty – not New York. Always people on the streets, all hours, all weather. The snowflakes are bigger now, which means it's probably going to stop soon. God, I hope so.

Who knew one Russian kid could cause such a stir? First, she doesn't show up at the docks this morning. That's Joseph's fault for not sending that kid to go talk to her. He knows the Kazuar's a soldier. She ain't capable of independent thought – she just follows orders. You tell her to wait somewhere for something, and she'll wait there, even if it's days. I've even caught her saluting Valentinov once or twice. He outranked her back in the army in Russia, and he still outranks her now. Though now, by a LOT more. And the penalties for insubordination in the family are a bit more severe than with the revolutionaries.

In his defense, though, Joseph probably never expected what happened to happen. Hell, I didn't, either. Even Valentinov didn't.

I didn't even bring the money this morning. When I heard word that Bianni didn't show for coffee at his usual joint, I had to run back and get a case from the boss. Can't shock the boss, though, he didn't even twitch. Even when I gave him Bianni's ring. The kid did good. Damned good.

The boss even came up with another idea, right away. Silvio.

Then, after I saw her go into the building upstairs of Luna's, Joseph went up. Developing 'rapport' or some bullshit.

But I wasn't ready for what happened at dinner. I mean… that's some serious shit right there. All with the cold and the ice and the frost on the glass and… She's just a kid. Isn't she?

Valentinov should have left her on the island. She'd be back in Moscow by now, or still holed up on the island. Either way, she wouldn't be here. I've got no idea what Valentinov's afraid she's getting too close to, but that's none of my business anyway. The best way to stay out of a body bag in the family is to keep your nose out of business that isn't yours to be concerned with.

Karpov. He's the driver now. The Kazuar got promoted to bouncer a couple of months back and now Karpov's the man. Now, by 'driver,' I don't mean someone to drive us home because if that were the case, I'd be saving my nickels right now. Drivers are reserved for… discreet and rapid retreats and departures.

If there's one thing the Kazuar's decent at, it's discretion.

"Think she can pull it off?" Cav asks me, softly.

"Huh?"

"Silvio. Think she can… you know?"

I shrug and look out the window again. "I dunno. Maybe."

Cav huffs a confident laugh, but it's faked. "I think we'll be findin' pieces a her in a coupla months."

He doesn't sound so sure. I think he's wondering exactly what I'm wondering: if she is bad enough to take down Lupo's bodyguard. If she is, great – saves any of us from having to do it.

"Hey." Cav's voice is a little softer in deference to the strange situation. "You think she really is a witch? You know… magic an' shit?"

I laugh in a way I hope is convincing. "Dinnit we stop believing in that crap two hundred years ago?"

"Yeah, I guess."

The slushy, gray, cold city out the car window captures my attention again, and silence falls for the remainder of the ride. My stop is first, and I watch the Stanley cut a pair of chill wakes in the slush on the street and trundle around a corner.

I look up at the sky. It's a gray-black, and snowflakes falling from it make it seem like I've flung myself into the stars. _Geezis, Silvio… do it already, an' spare me Valentinov's orders. I don' think I'm up for it._

_

* * *

_


	6. 6: An Unfortunate Slight

Disclaimer & Legal Stuff: SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED. UNINVITED TM & © Alanis Morissette.

Rating: PG-13, Violence, Language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – An Unfortunate Slight**

It had been two months earlier when Giuseppe Ignazio dropped the hint that perhaps Maria's career might be furthered if she could manage to remove a certain leech from the family's books.

Carlo Bianni frequented all the same establishments as the rest of the men (and rare occasional women) who worked for Ignazio. Originally, Maria had had no intention of becoming an assassin. The suggestion had been made to her on several occasions by Joseph, by Valentinov and even by the boss himself. She'd been offered money to take care of the situation - $450, to be exact, a rather impressive sum, and enough money to keep her fed and dressed and from being tossed out into the streets in the onset of winter in New York – and the next three winters after that, if she was frugal. Still, she could not decide.

One night, she'd told Valentinov she was going to try to talk to Bianni, see if she could get information from him, at least – and perhaps the information would be worth enough to pay a few months' rent.

_It must be strangely exciting to watch The Stoic squirm._

"An excellent idea, my little one," Valentinov smiled and stretched out his arms to her. They were in the cigar lounge of an uptown restaurant, and Valentinov was sitting in a leather armchair. Maria dreaded stepping toward him. The combination of the smell of old leather and stale cigar smoke in the wool of Valentinov's blazer was repulsive. She sank to one knee beside his chair, and he took her by the shoulders and kissed her on both cheeks, falling just short of a fatherly gesture. Then he did not release her.

"Major… let me go." To Maria, this was a routine. Be polite enough to appease his anger some of the time, and gently ward off his advances the rest of the time – all the while remembering that, with her beloved Yuri gone, their superior officer, Major Valentinov, was all she had in the world.

"You were… what was it, nine years old, Maria? Nine when your father was killed? He was a diplomat, exiled for his sympathy for the people, and died in Siberia..." Sympathy welled in Valentinov's eyes, making him appear gentle despite the grip he had on her arms. "A revolutionary. Such powerful blood is in your veins, Maria."

Maria froze, both apprehensive and confused. "Major…"

_Like anyone would be, I am flattered by your fascination with me._

Valentinov released one of her arms and brushed back her hair. "You were bred to be a killer. You were fifteen or sixteen when Yuri – God rest his soul – took you in. In two years' time, you were more than just his protégé. His _aide du camp_, his most trusted one… his most beloved one."

He slid a finger under the chain of her locket and began to pull it from her shirt. She grabbed his wrist and stopped him.

_But this is not allowed. You're uninvited._

Valentinov, as if coming back to himself, released her and covered his face with his hands. "I apologize, Maria… please forgive me. I miss him too, you see. If only I had been there… If only I had been in command of my unit, instead of leaving it to the captain… If only Yuri had had his commanding officer beside him… I might have died with him, but…"

If only. Yes, if only. That was a phrase to which Maria had grown quite accustomed, she used it all the time, in her mind, each time she recalled the incident. If only she had sent the soldiers on their retreat and then remained at Yuri's side. If only she'd faced down the enemy ambush with him. They might well have both died, but they might also have beaten back the oppressors. Instead, she hesitated. And then fled, as ordered, supporting a soldier who'd taken a bullet to the gut. She carried him still when a bullet grazed her side, and then knocked her rifle from her right hand, and fell finally when the bullet tore through her leg. Two other soldiers helped the wounded man to his feet, but Maria refused aid, and turned to look for Yuri. He'd thrown a grenade, then turned to run back toward her.

"_Captain!"_ She lay in the snow, her blood seeping into the whiteness around her leg, and reached out with a bleeding hand. "_No!"_

She shook her head to clear it and looked up at Valentinov. He ran his hands through his white hair, pulling it back from his eyes and blinking to dry tears. "Maria, I…"

"Yes, Major?" Her voice was not expectant, not the throaty whisper his was. Her eyes were not anticipatory, not tormented as his were. She was on one knee as she might have been before a prince or czar. And her eyes were cold, indifferent. Her voice merely readiness to hear an order from a superior officer. Her voice, her eyes, her indifference, they dissuaded him from speaking.

"I am proud of the work you have done, and wish you well tonight," he said quickly and stood, turning his back to her. He paused, measuring his breathing, calming his anger at his own reticence, and at the nonsensical behaviour the proximity of this girl seemed to cause in him.

_Like any uncharted territory, I must seem greatly intriguing._

"Thank you, Major," Maria stood abruptly and gave a brief nod of her head in respect, even though Valentinov's back was to her. "Good n—"

"Wait!" Valentinov spun around and held out a hand as if to stop her. "Wait, don't… don't go. Not just yet. I…"

Now Maria was confused. Valentinov had been drinking. And smoking cigars. And brooding. It was not a good combination, and typically lead him to bouts of moodiness that Maria found uncomfortable, and thus typically avoided.

"There is… so much to say, and… never the time…" Valentinov mused, gazing at the brandy glass sitting on the end table next to the leather armchair he'd been sitting in earlier.

"Time?" Maria attempted to seem detached, only mildly interested. "I will see you tomorrow, Major. When I return with my report." She spoke it as a reassurance. In the Revolution, they were accustomed to believing they might not see tomorrow.

"Yes… tomorrow." Valentinov nodded. "I will see you tomorrow."

Upstairs after the meeting in Luna's, Maria paced the length of her room, back and forth. She was not unpacked. And she would not become any more unpacked if she simply continued pacing.

She needed a plan. And plans tended to formulate themselves when one was working. Maria set to work on her few boxes and duffel, setting up her meagre belongings in the newly exanded apartment above the restaurant on Mulberry Street. There was something cathartic about organizing. It was routine, automaton. It could almost be considered living, when her heart wasn't certain it could continue beating under the strain of so much grief.

Last night she had killed a man. And tonight she was asked to kill another.

Maria smoothed the blankets on the bed, straightened the sheet.

Valentinov was behaving strangely. When he fell into moods such as these, she began to wonder about her former commanding officer. Where had his squadron been? Where was the support they so desperately needed when Yuri's troops were ambushed? They had promised their support. Valentinov, as a Major, outranked Yuri, and outranked Maria a great distance. She had never asked. He had apologized, wished he was present. Often, that was enough to soothe her, but… Sometimes it made her wonder. Why would he not appear to help? The enemy forces were far greater than they'd anticipated. They didn't have a chance, especially without Major Valentinov and his squadrons.

She drew closed the blinds on the windows which faced the street and turned down the wick in the kerosene lamp. She splashed cold water on her face from the sink, attempting to clear her mind enough to sleep well. No plan would come to her if she could not drag her focus from Valentinov's moodiness.

Silvio. Lupo's bodyguard. _Bozhe moy._

She pressed a cloth to her face to dry it and exhaled, sitting down on her bed.

She needed to tail him. Study him. Learn his habits, his patterns, his routine. But that would be almost impossible without being seen.

Maria pulled one foot up onto the bed and rapidly pulled her bootlaces free with deft fingers, then set the boot at the foot of the chair beside her bed in an orderly fashion, then did the same with the other. She shrugged out of the pin striped jacket and hung it over the back of the chair, then paused, drawing a long breath again. Her chest seemed to ache as if she were frequently forgetting to breathe.

There was the distint possibility that she could not manage this job. Silvio. The bodyguard of one of the biggest mobsters in New York City. And possibly Chicago as well. Why her? Did Ignazio really have no one else more capable? And why kill Lupo's bodyguard, but not Lupo? Was it a warning? A threat? A message? Would Lupo turn his sites on her, then? What did Ignazio hope to accomplish by assassinating a bodyguard?

_I don't think you unworthy. I need a moment to deliberate._

She pulled her belt from its loops and hung it over the back of her chair as well, and carefully folding her pin-striped pants along the pressed line along the fronts of the legs. She set them on the seat of the chair and reached for the button at the throat of her long white shirt.

"Mari-- oh!"

Maria spun around just as her door slammed closed, her revolver aimed at the door in her right hand, and her left fist holding her oversized shirt against her. She was poised on her sock-clad toes, ready to move in whatever direction was required. "Who is there!"

The muffled voice from the other side of the door was sheepish. "It's Joseph, Maria, I… I-I'm sorry! I shoulda knocked…"

That went without saying. Maria seethed, her brows lowering and her revolver NOT lowering as she approached the door to bolt it, locking Joseph outside.

"Maria?" Joseph turned the knob to no avail, then remembered to knock. "Maria, can I come in? I just wanted to explain about the whole Lupo Silvio thing. Please?"

"Go away, Joseph. Is nothing to be explained." Maria set her gun down and set to pacing again.

"Look, I know I told you it was gonna be Lupo, an' I wasn't just trying to scare ya. Really – it was supposed to be. So, I think that might be a next step. You want to know why we're doing this or what?"

"Idiot!" Maria whispered. "You are going to… to shout all these… secret things… through a door?"

"I wouldn't have to if you would let me in."

"You won't because… you are _nyet_ stupid. _Dobre vecher, _Joseph." Maria ignored him then, turning the wick out in the lamp, ending any light that might have emanated from her room. She pulled off her socks and stuck them into the tops of her boots. She could see the shadows of his shoes under her door in the light from the hall. For a moment, he remained in silence, seemingly considering whether to go or stay.

In the end, he chose to let her be, and she heard his footsteps dimish. Then she hung her shirt over the chair and pulled the blankets up to her chin. Turning onto her left side to wrap her arms around her second pillow as if in an embrace, she drew up her knees, buried her face in the pillow and hid from the world just long enough for sleep to find her.

* * *

**Russian Glossary:**

_Bozhe moy._ – My god.

_Dobre vecher_ – Good night.


	7. 7: Why You Keep Your Silence Up

Disclaimer & Legal Stuff: SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED. Chapter title courtesy of Phil Collins' "I Can Feel It Coming In The Air Tonight"

Rating: PG-13, Language, Violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Why You Keep Your Silence Up**

"Come in," he yells through his door to me, and I do.

Joseph's apartment isn't above the Luna. Only two of Ignazio's direct employs live up there. Joseph lives uptown a ways, near Central Park. Nice digs he has, too. When you're the only heir to the second most powerful and influential mob family in New York City, you only have one problem: the heir to the first most powerful and influential mob family.

I duck my hat off my head into my hand, combining the gesture of a head bow and taking the hat off. I hang it and my trenchcoat on the free standing oak hat rack near the door. Joseph is sitting in his living room on a leather sofa lined all around with brass upholstry tacks. His ankle is crossed over his knee, and an newspaper is open in his lap. He has a cigar and a glass of brandy in the same hand. It's after noon, so it seems that is acceptable. The only thing unacceptable about it to me is the fact that it's not whiskey.

"Find anything?" I ask him, jutting my chin at his newspaper.

"Not a word. Three days after the fact, and they don't even mention anyone missing, let alone dead." Joseph gestured with his vice-laden hand at the chair beside the sofa. "Siddown."

I do. I lean back and mimick his crossed-leg position, lacing my fingers together over my stomach. The key is to always look relaxed when in the presence of a wolf more alpha than you are. Relaxed, and non-threatening.

"What did you find out, anything?"

"Yeah, a little. Mosta them didn't see nothin'." That is to her credit, again. There shouldn't be witnesses.

"Can I get you a drink?"

I wave him off. Not this early. Not in this conversation.

"Then will you detail to me how the Kazuar killed Carlo Bianni?"

Yeah, sure. Because that's easy. The stories I got from three different 'witnesses' were so convoluted I could hardly make sense of them. And two of the witnesses were homeless immigrants who spoke little, if any, English. And the third was a scared kid, Bianni's messenger. "Well, there's three version of the story, ya see. An' none of the sources are exactly whatcha call reliable."

"Any information is better than none."

"Yeah, true enough. Okay, firs' guy is some bum muttering in half English an' half Italian, an' he was scared. Said he'd seen the legendary firebird, consuming the earth in flame, purifying it. It was like he was some religious nut."

Joseph Ignazio chuckles. "Wonderful. Instead of subtlty, we get vigilante legends."

"I don' think we gotta worry about that guy spreading stuff around. Second lady's not much better. Sellin' flowers an' saw what she says was an angel of vengeance. It wasn't no sniper shot the Kazuar got on him. It was a fight."

Joseph's eyebrows lift. "She _fought_ him? She battled him and killed him?" He gives a laugh of surprise, clearly impressed. "And here I thought she shot him from the roof of a neighbouring building."

"Naw, and here's the most amazing part, she didn't shoot him at all."

Now he's choking on his brandy, and hell, I don't blame him. He repeats my statement as a question, so I repeat it again as a statement, nodding my head.

"Impossible! A little girl against Carlo Bianni, unarmed? Where is the body?"

"I dunno. Nobody knows. He ain't turned up, an' the Kazuar ain' talkin'."

Joseph nods and purses his lips in approval. "No, she wouldn't, would she? So how did she kill him if she didn't shoot him?"

"It was down by Battery Park. This account's from Michael, Bianni's messenger kid. Bianni and the kid were down there when the Kazuar showed up. She _talked_ to him, Joseph. For the love a God, she _talked_ to Bianni. Kid said she seemed like she was trying to save everyone involved, askin' for his books. He refused, and she decided to just go. But Bianni now knew he'd been figured out, an' he sure as hell wasn't gonna let this chick go back to your uncle with the information. So he goes for his gun as she turns to leave."

I sit forward in my seat. It's like recounting a boxing match to Joseph, and Joseph is leaning forward too, listening raptly to my story. Thank God for the Irish gift of storytelling. "Jus' as he's pullin' out his gun, she spins around an' kicks the gun over into the water. So he gets a handful of her hair, right? An' she ain't got her gun out. He's got her, he thinks. Spins her around with her back to him, one fist in her hair an' the other arm around her throat, he can jus' break her neck, or cut her throat, or throw her over into the water. Looks like he's gonna do the last one, 'cause he drags her toward the rails. An' she braces a foot against a cement pylon and shoves backward, crushing Bianni against the steel rails. It hurts enough for him to let go of her, an' she spins around again, taking her gun out. It ain't loaded, though. So she cold cocks him over the head wit' it."

"All this time, the kid's jus' standin' there doin' his best not ta wet himself. An' the Kazuar's got him back against the railing, her fists in his collar. He wants to throw her over, and she wants to throw him over – but he's a hell of a lot bigger than she is. Then CRACK! He smashes his head into hers and she goes limp like a corpse. He's got her by the arms, but she's tall, he can't just toss her over. So he steps up and straddles the railing, right? Because he's gonna pull her up and throw her over into the bay. Only the Kazuar's not unconscious, she's playing possum. Yeah, the blow hurt, but it didn't kill her. An' he gets over the railing and leans back to haul her weight up. That's when she comes all alert-like, all of a sudden, and stands up, gives him a solid shove. She's still on the land side of the railing, and all you hear of Bianni is a yell and a splash."

"She threw him into the harbour? But what about the kid? And then how did she get his ring?"

"I'm gettin' there…" Joseph is rapt. He's on the edge of his seat, too. "The kid yells, too, and the Kazuar whips her gun around and aims it at him. He says, all cocky-like, 'That ain't loaded,' an' the Kazuar's like, 'You'd bet your life on that?'" I do my best Russian dialect on that line, changing my facial expression to match her icy, unruffled one, glaring at Joseph as if he were the kid. "So the kid bolts as the Kazuar runs to the jetties." I shrug. "That's all the kid knows. Probably she got his body from the rocks below an' that's where she got the ring. Because that area's been searched, me an' Cav made sure o' that. An' there ain't nothin' down there."

Joseph leans back again, the leather of his sofa creaking. The gears in his brain are working, I can see them. He's got ideas and plans. And if I play my cards exactly right, he'll let me know what they are. And perhaps let me in on a cut of whatever profit they might turn out.

* * *


	8. 8: I Have Become the Nightmare

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2006 SEGA RED, and are used here without permission.

Rating: PG-13, Language, Significant Violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – I Have Become The Nightmare **

_Volgograd, Russia. April 11, 1913._

"_Ten, Major Valentinov. I was ten when my father died in exile. I was ten."_

Maria laid her father's rifle on his gravestone. It was snowing. She was alone.

For as long as she could remember, her father had spoken out against Czar Nicholas II. Russia was so busy with its war against Japan that it forgot frequently to worry about its own people and economy. Maria's father was Russian, her mother Japanese. And this, during the time of the Russo-Japanese War, made life extremely difficult for them. Korea and Manchuria were in debate – whether they were to be owned by Russia or Japan was to be decided by the war. Neither country owned either Korea or Manchuria, and in the end of the war, very few lessons were learned. Maria was only two years old when the war ended, but hostilities took years to wane, especially in the Central Asia part of Russia where Maria and her family lived. In Volga, the Bundofschieks' vigilantism was not restricted to the Germans and Jews. And in 1912, Maria's Japanese mother was killed.

"_I was nine years old, Major."_

It was February 10, 1904 when Japan declared war on Russia. Japan… a tiny island country… declared war on Russia… one of the largest countries in the world. And Japan proceeded to win every single naval and land battle with Russia until Theodore Roosevelt of the United States stepped in to stop the absolute massacre. Japan won the war, but fairness in spoils was overseen by the United States. Russia was left demoralized, bankrupt, and thoroughly defeated. Over the next ten years, prices of necessary goods to common people increased by SIX HUNDRED percent. Russia's common people spiraled into poverty, destitution and angry desperation.

Starting in 1910, people began to strike out as last resort in effort to get their point across to Nicholas II, Emperor of All Russias, Czar of Poland, Grand Duke of Finland, et cetera. Russia was still reeling from the Russo-Japanese War, and the United States' intervention parlayed the entire altercation into World War I, coinciding with the Russian people's protest against their current government only three years earlier.

The Russian common people cried out for help, including Maria Tachibana's father, a diplomat exiled to Siberia. And a man named Lenin answered the cries. Penniless and forgotten in the icy wastelands, Maria's mother and father succumbed to the cold and died in 1912 and 1913. Maria did not give in to the cold - she became it.

She could hear the tune of a lullaby her father sang to her as she stood in the snow before his grave.

_On a night the stars fell, you were born._

_In your mother's arms, you weakly wept_

_Without knowing happiness,_

_Without knowing sadness,_

_With eyes as innocent as the night the stars fell._

_You are a small version of me,_

_A tiny, precious life._

_Red Katyusha who does not know yet_

_The meaning of Hell._

_Tears do not fall on frozen soil._

_Your mother will wrap you only in warmth._

_Anyone can survive in grief and sorrow,_

_But you cannot walk the earth with a frozen heart._

_If the whole earth were frozen and there was no milk,_

_I would give you my very blood._

_If, in the depths of despair, you discover love,_

_You will know it is Red Katyusha._

The song was entirely new to her now – the words, formerly meaningless recollections of a Russian folk story, suddenly struck her to the core.

"Your father was a man of great fortitude and honour."

Maria gasped in surprise and turned to see a young man standing beside her. She recognized him. Her father had served beside him. After many battles, Yuri-Mikhail Nikolayevich had been promoted to Captain of the Volga Third Regiment.

_Who were you fighting, Father?_ she would often wonder. _The Czar? The Bundofshieks? The Bolsheviks? Who will save us? Who will we defend? And when you die… who will honour you?_

No one. That had been Maria's answer. No one would honour her father with her, and she would stand alone at his grave. Until Captain Nikolayevich appeared. He stood beside her with his fur hat in his hands, his head bowed, his eyes closed behind his darkly tinted glasses. Sorrow had drawn his face solemnly, but his eyes were dry. Maria's own eyelashes were spiked with tears, and she glanced away, feeling somehow lesser for standing beside such a strong young man. He could be no older than sixteen. But to the ten year old Maria Tachibana, he felt instantly like a protector, like an older brother.

Captain Nikolayevich replaced his hat and turned to go. He stopped only a few paces away. "If you wish to learn to face life with the same courage as your father did, come and find me someday."

"_Ten, Major. I was ten when I went to Yuri. I was ten."_

"Attention!" Captain Yuri-Mikhail Nikolayevich called to his regiment, and they stood from their various activities, polishing boots, securing tent posts, coaxing fires into existence in the snow. Yuri's face hinted at the ghost of a smile. "Czar Nicholas II has abdicated!"

A roar of cheers and shouts rose up from the men, leaping and embracing each other. This was a tremendous step in the Revolution.

"Second Lieutenant!" Yuri turned to look at her. Maria snapped to attention and saluted when she was called, her face grave and serious, barely held over the elated smile. "See that the men get a drink tonight, in celebration!"

"Yes, captain!"

And later, he embraced her, almost laughing with relief. Heroes! They would be the heroes of the toiling and exploited Russian people! He held her away from him by the shoulders and braced her, proudly. "You do a great honour to your father's memory, Maria."

Maria was overcome. An indescribable ache and longing combined with the uncontainable joy in her heart. For just the briefest moment, she admitted to herself that she loved this man, more than anyone in the world.

"And you do a great honour to me, and to our regiment."

The world around them seemed to melt away. "And to my memory…" and Yuri flickered and faded, like a ghost.

"Captain!"

The sound of the explosion of riflefire made her cry out in surprise…

…and she sat bolt upright in bed, drenched in a cold sweat.

The apartment was dark and a little cold. And very silent, very empty. A late snow silenced even the perpetual sounds of the New York streets just before dawn sought to reveal them for their true shortcomings in the late March chill.

Maria choked back a sob and rubbed the heel of her palm across her cheeks to dry the tears she'd shed in her sleep.

She stumbled from her bed and stopped in front of the bathroom mirror, leaning on the counter and staring at her bleary, red-eyed face.

She had a job to do, as was usual. Her two months were almost over. She had been following Silvio for six and a half weeks. She knew nearly every aspect of his routine. She knew when he was alone, when he was surrounded by people, which people were his most trusted and which were likely to leave him to bleed to death in the street. She knew when he was with Lupo – which was nearly all the time – and the precious slices of time when he was not near him and was alone and vulnerable. She knew the patrols of the police, which shifts were assigned to which officers, and where their beats began and ended, when they overlapped. Which cops were more astute and which were inept, she knew what buildings were open around the clock and which had daily hours and which were closed down, which were abandoned and which were in noise-pits where sound either could not escape or would be drowned out. She knew what Silvio's preferences were, which strangers could approach him without arousing suspicion and which ones put him on his guard immediately. She knew with which merchants and shop owners he interacted, what food he regularly ordered. She had a half dozen feasable plans for killing him. But she would execute none of them until her full eight weeks were up.

She sat on the stool in front of the vanity and opened a box of makeup. Maria was young and tall, and her hair was short, her demeanour the stiff, severe physicality of a soldier. This leant itself perfectly to the deception she had been running.

Within an hour, Maria stood and regarded a sly, dour young man reflecting back at her from her bathroom mirror. Long strips of light cotton bound her chest. Her hair was tousled beneath her cabbie hat, her shirtsleeve cuffs undone. Her hands were not gloved, but the length of the oversized shirtsleeves covered her hands just past her knuckles. She'd penciled her eyebrows darker, shadowed her jawline and cheekbones. Her vest covered the dip of her waistline and her pants hung straight to the tops of her shoes. Her voice was low enough to pass for a boy in his mid teens.

There was nothing she could do about looking Russian. So she took on the name Petyev. She looked like perhaps it was her job to sell newspapers or run bookings or take tickets.

One of Silvio's favourite hangouts was her destination this morning. He had lunch almost without fail in a tavern in Greenwich Village.

It was half past noon. Maria leaned heavily on the pool table, examining the balls left on the table. Her fist was tightly around the cue and she was careful to lean with equal weight between her feet to avoid jutting a hip. She kept her arms and elbows away from her sides, kept her head slightly ducked – she was just slightly too pretty to pass for a boy without at least a second glance. She'd been managing for a month, though, and her confidence had increased.

Maria was _excellent_ at billiards. She had her shot already, but was using this moment to give careful scrutiny to Silvio's table. He was with Lupo, of course.

"Hey, kid. Call it." The man across the pool table from Maria blew a lungful of smoke over his shoulder. He was heavy, his face pock-marked by years of shaving, his hair thinning. His tie didn't quite touch his belt.

"Nine," Maria whispered, her voice dropped a couple of notches in pitch and volume to avoid curiosity and detection. "Corner." She jutted her chin at the pocket to which she was referring and stepped back from the table, lowering her cue across the pads.

It was like a rifle. It was even as long as a bayonetted rifle. Exactly as long as the rifle she'd weilded in the Revolution. Aim was only partially geometric. Angles, trajectory, speed, obstacles… billiards was a marksman's game. The cue ball was the hammer, and the nine ball was the bullet. The corner pocket was the target.

_CRACK!_

The nine sank cleanly, and the cue bounced off a bumper pad and rolled lazily across the green felt toward another striped ball. Maria followed it in non-chalant confidence. The banker on his lunch hour clucked his tongue, rolled his eyes and sighed. "Ya killin' me, kid."

_No,_ Maria thought as she lined up her next shot, _if I were killing you, you'd already be dead. I am killing the man in the booth behind you._ "Eleven, side."

"You rebounding that?" the banker asked, a little surprised. It was a difficult shot.

Maria stood up straight, looking over the banker's shoulder. _Lupo had just left!_ Silvio was still at the booth, alone! This was unprecedented... Silvio never left this bar without Lupo, never let Lupo leave all on his own.

"_Da…_" she nodded in absentminded response to the banker, laying her cue down again to line up the shot, glancing frequently at the booth now occupied by only her target. And in the shift of focus, she missed. The eleven ball bounced off the bumper pad at the side pocket and rolled away. The cue ball dropped into the side pocket.

"Ha! Scratch. Tough luck, kid," the banker whapped Maria on the back, right between the shoulderblades. She huffed and staggered, then regained her balance. "Geez, my first turn an' you got ONE ball left on the table. Nex' time, I break, awright?"

Maria nodded dumbly, her attention elsewhere completely. She stepped to the far side of the table, placing the table between herself and Silvio's booth, where she could keep an eye on Silvio and seem like she was watching the pool table.

The banker blew a shot and it was Maria's turn. If she took too long, Silvio could walk out while she was shooting. So she blew her shot.

"Whassamatta kid, ya beginner's luck runnin' out?"

"Must be, heh…" Maria chuckled and shrugged, sheepishly, glancing sideward at Silvio's booth.

"Yeah, well, good t'ing we ain't got no money on dis game, huh?"

And during this turn of the banker's Silvio stood. Maria's heart lurched. It was broad daylight outside. Only one of her plans would work in daylight, and that would require her being in a considerably more flattering outfit. It galled her, but she was going to have to let this perfect opportunity slip away.

At least she could follow him and find out what made him let Lupo leave alone. The banker was bent over his next shot, a bank shot that would require significant concentration, his back was to her.

She slipped out the door after Silvio before the banker could even notice she was leaving.

Maria skillfully kept at least a half a street block behind Silvio, following him uptown. He was in no hurry, strolling along. He never glanced over his shoulder, but regardless, Maria made certain there were several people between them obscuring her at all times.

After about six blocks, he turned up an avenue and then down a less busy street. Maria knew this neighbourhood. He slipped into an alley with no outlet. Confused, she watched the outlet from about four buildings away for a few long moments, then crept slowly closer. She ducked into a doorway about ten feet from the corner that lead into the alley. Silvio had still not emerged. She strained to listen for voices. Nothing.

What in the world could he be doing standing alone in an alley with no outlets and no doors? Was there an escape Maria did not know about? She slipped out of the doorway and pressed her back to the brick wall just around the corner of the alley, crossing her ankles and folding her arms as if just lounging there, pulling the brim of her cabbie hat down to obscure her gaze. She sharpened her ears to any noise that could be coming from the alley. Nothing.

Damn it, she'd lost him. She exhaled and straightened up just as a fist grabbed the throat of her button-down shirt and hauled her around the corner.

Silvio. A gust of adrenaline rocketed through her, making her limbs tingle in battle readiness. Silvio's fist whistled toward her face and she blocked. His punch broke right through her block, bruising her arm and her temple and throwing her to the ground. She scrambled to her feet and Silvio strode after her. He snagged her by the back of the collar and hauled her backward.

"You followin' me, kid?" Silvio's voice was a dry, raspy whisper, the voice of someone who's smoked most of his life. He slammed Maria's back against the brick wall and held her there by the shoulders. A bright pain in the back of her skull spread through her ears and eyes. The wind was knocked out of her. Her eyes were squeezed closed and her teeth gritted. "Eh? You followin' me?" He pulled her away from the wall and slammed her back again to emphasize the seriousness of his question, eliciting a nondescript grunt of pain. "Who sent you to follow me, huh? Who?"

He gave her a slight shake against the wall instead of another impact, fearing to knock his captive out before he could get answers from what appeared to be someone's messenger boy.

"N-no one…" she managed, demanding that her eyes regain focus, and landing her glare solidly on Silvio's own glare. Silvio stepped back and hauled her away from the wall, slinging her across the narrow alley and releasing her to strike the far alley wall and sink to the ground on her hands and knees with a groan of pain. Her right cheek bore scrapes from the brick, thin red lines with tiny beads of blood. The world seemed to melt beneath her, giving her the feeling that she was on a boat, or sliding off the side of a mountain.

"Dangerous work, kid. You sure you wanna get into this? Who sentcha ta follow me around, huh?"

Maria put a hand to her head. Her hat had fallen off. Her head was spinning. She lifted a hand to attempt to stand up from her hands and knees. Her palms were scraped. Her knees ached. Her shoulder throbbed.

Silvio delivered a solid kick to her ribcage and she collapsed to the pavement, choking. "Answer, kid, or the morning paper finds your corpse in this dumpster." Silvio's questions were terrifying in their placidity. He was not outraged. His voice was not angry at all. It was simply as if he was stating fact after fact, going through required motions, emotionless. That was more terrifying than the icy rage Maria displayed to her enemies. He was… clinical.

He twisted a handful of shirt fabric at Maria's shoulder and hauled her to her feet with his left hand, setting her back against the wall again, and spinning a knife open in his right hand. He lay the blade of the knife against her throat and stepped close, pressing her hard against the wall. The white of her shirt was beginning to bloom rusty red stains at the elbows and right shoulder. A tiny trickle of blood ran from the edge of the knife down the hollow of her throat, disappearing under the collar of her shirt.

Silvio blinked in surprise, staring at his knife. The throat against which he held it was smooth. No adam's apple. He lowered the knife, stunned. "You ain't a boy…"

Maria's head was reeling, but she knew this was her only chance. She brought up a knee and it connected hard with Silvio's groin. Silvio nearly gagged and stepped back. Maria shoved away from the wall and ran out of the alley, her legs struggling to keep her upright as she barrelled down the street and away.

Silvio did not even try to pursue her. He could not have, because with how poorly Maria's legs were working, he would easily have caught her.

* * *


	9. 9: Pulled from the Wreckage

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

_**Author's Note: **Karpov, Maria and Valentinov do not speak English very well. Valentinov is relatively good, Maria is not very good, Karpov is miserable. In the scenes where you read them speaking English very beautifully and eloquently, it is because they are actually speaking in Russian and I have written it in English. I have attempted to make that clear, and apologize if I failed at points._

Rating: PG-13, Language, Violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Pulled From The Wreckage **

Karpov's driving duties don't keep him very busy, so Ignazio sends him around from time to time as a messenger. Him, Valentinov and the Kazuar are the only three Russians we got. Valentinov brought two others with him, but they, uh… sought… other… interests. If ya know what I mean.

So anyways, I'm done with Karpov, he's brief and to the point – kinda vacant… a lot like the Kazuar is. The Russian Revolution must be some war. Heck, it lead us to where we are now, which is the whole world at war, so maybe it is awful. Either way, there's not much small talk from the Ruskies. So I'm headed downstairs to Luna's and see if she can get me some coffee.

I'm just about to open the door at the bottom of the stairs that leads to the street when it bangs open and some kid bursts through, staggering like he's drunk as a skunk. The door cracks into my hand as I'm reaching for the knob and I yank my hand back and grip it.

"Ah! Hey!" He tries to push past me, but I grab him by the arm. He's trying to pull away.

Ignazio doesn't own this whole building, but I know all the people who live above Luna's – ours and otherwise – and this kid ain't one of them. I dunno what business he's got upstairs, but he looks suspicious, in a hurry, and he's bloody. I wrap both arms around his arms and ribs from behind and pick him up off the floor. He's tall, but wiry – and he's already hurt, so this isn't hard. I kick the door closed and set him on his feet, turn him around, and hold him back against it.

"What the devil do you think y—" Two things strike me at the same time. First, how badly wounded this guy is. Second, this guy is a girl. It's the Kazuar. "Holy Jeezis…"

You know when you're in a crisis situation, and you can just keep going as long as you need to, just because you _need _to? And when the need for you to carry on stops, your ability to carry on stops, too? Well, the Kazuar's need to remain conscious just ended. Her eyes flutter closed and she collapses. Fortunately, I'm standing right here, and I catch her.

Bloody hell. At least this time, she only lives on the third floor instead of the fifth. She's not all that heavy, but she's tall. I bend my knees and let her fall forward over my shoulder. I'd be a little more respectful and carry her in my arms, but the staircase is just too narrow.

I'm halfway up the second flight when I encounter someone coming down. It's Karpov. He stops, staring at me. Even if the Kazuar wasn't disguised as a boy, I don't think Karpov would recognize her from what little of her he could see – which would be the back of her from the waist down. "Gimme a hand, would ya?"

Karpov's eyes narrow.

"She ain't dead, she just passed out. It's the Kazuar. C'mon."

Now urgency registers with him and he turns and runs back up the stairs, preceding me. He turns the handle on her door, and it doesn't open.

"Christ… it's locked?" I ask him as he drops to his knees in front of the door, drawing a tool out of his pocket and staring at the lock. "Ya know, it'd prolly be a helluva lot faster if ya jus' got Valentinov. I think he's got a key ta dis room on accounta he's the one who s—"

The door swings open as Karpov stands, pocketing the tool and gesturing me to proceed him.

"Yeah. That was fast. So, you prolly oughta get Valentinov anyway, jus' ta let him know th—"

Karpov's gone. Yeesh. Soldiers.

I do my best to lay the Kazuar down gently. I cringe and hiss through my teeth. She's pretty well beaten. And after the stories I heard about how she took care of Bianni, this had to have been someone GOOD to have managed this on her. Christ… What if it's Lupo's gang? What if they know about the mark on Silvio? What if they think we're conspiring? What if she just blew everything wide open?

I'm pacing and worrying. Somewhere in the back of my mind, it occurs to me that I should probably see if there's anything I can do for the kid before Valentinov sees me up here dumping her like she was already a corpse. The dishcloth on the sink doesn't look none too sterile. So I pull open a drawer and rummage for something cotton. I find something that looks short-sleeved and thermal, and run it under cold water for a couple of seconds then wring it out.

I drag a chair over to the bed and sit, and put the cold cloth against her scraped and bruised cheek. It comes away bloody. She doesn't even flinch, she'd out cold.

Karpov follows Valentinov into the room, and Valentinov closes the door behind him. Valentinov doesn't even glance at me. The way he's headed toward the chair, it looks like he's going to take my place whether I'm out of it yet or not, so I get out of it, quick. He takes the cloth out of my hand and sits in the chair I was in without noting my presence at all. I back up a couple of steps and stand by Karpov. I glance at him, but his focus is fixed on her, too. I could probably walk out and not be missed, about now. But something feels like that might also draw their attention.

"Maria…" Valentinov's brushing her hair back from her face and whispering to her, holding the cloth to her cheek and looking for other wounds. "Maria, _eta siryozna? Shto s vami?"_

I feel a little like a deer who brought back a wounded lioness to her den. It's a strange feeling, being surrounded by these… intimidating soldiers who have decided English isn't a necessary effort just for my benefit at the moment.

"_Tavarish, gavaritye…_" Valentinov shakes her shoulder lightly. No response. Karpov steps forward and takes the cloth from him. He runs it under water to make it colder again and wrings it out. Valentinov stands and gives the Kazuar a once-over. Touching arms and legs to see if she flinches in pain – she doesn't. He rolls up her sleeve to find the sources of blood on her right arm.

I flinch again. I've never seen the Kazuar without gloves on. And now I know why that is. Besides the old scar, though, her palm, elbow and shoulder are scraped. Her shirt is ripped at the shoulder seam, pretty widely. Looks like she was yanked around by it.

"_Gaspadin, vyzavitye pashalusta vracha_," Karpov says softly to Valentinov.

"_Yirunda! Tishe, _Karpov," Valentino scowls, seeming derisive of whatever Karpov had just said. Karpov tries to interject again, but Valentinov cuts him off. "_Pashol von! Astaftye minya f pakoye!"_

With that, Valentinov makes a sweeping gesture with his arm that causes Karpov to step back. Karpov is silent for a moment as Valentinov turns back to the Kazuar, then sits down on the edge of her bed and holds the cloth to her cheek again. Then Karpov turns to look at me. He pins me with a vacant, snowy gaze, and then flicks that gaze to the door and back to me.

We're going, it seems. I push off from the counter I'd been leaning on and head for the door. Karpov opens it for me and closes it behind us.

Have I mentioned yet how damned scary the Russians are?

**

* * *

Russian Glossary:**

"Maria, _eta siryozna? Shto s vami?"_ – Maria, is it serious? What is the matter?

"_Tavarish, gavaritye…_" – Comrade, answer me…

"_Gaspadin, vyzavitye pashalusta vracha_," – Sir, please call a doctor.

"_Yirunda! Tishe, _Karpov," – Nonsense. Quiet, Karpov.

"_Pashol von! Astaftye minya f pakoye!"_ – Go away! Leave me alone!


	10. 10: Trade Your Heroes for Ghosts

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED. "WISH YOU WERE HERE" TM & © Pink Floyd.

_Author's Note: There is much debate over what sort of relationship existed between Maria and Yuri, why she wears his photo in a locket, etc. Either she holds him in extremely high respect, or she felt he was like a brother to her, or they were lovers. Based upon hints from the OVAs and TV series, the lyrics to Maria's "Only Man" in the live performances (in which she quotes Yuri as saying "I was serious about that.") where Urara Takano spends her whole first scene heavily drunk and collapsing over this and that chair, weeping about "my only love" -- and several hints that of the "maidens" of the TKD, only Maria does not fit that term – I have decided that, for the purposes of my story, it is most likely that they were lovers. Besides, a recent official comic has confirmed that there was more between Maria and Yuri than sibling-like affection._

_Author's Legality Note: This may seem overly cautious, but I... am squeamish about writing about Yuri and Maria with Maria being only 14. In the U.S., the age of consent is generally 16. In the state I live in, it's 17. In Japan, it's 18. In Russia, it's FOURTEEN. So, in the official story, technically, Maria was of the age of consent in 1917 in Russia. Regardless, I have pushed the date of Yuri's death up a couple of years, because I am not comfortable writing a twenty year old man kissing a fourteen year old girl. So she's sixteen instead. Just for my own comfort._

_Author's Continuity Note: As a wise fanfic writer recently told to me, firstly, my background for Maria is incorrect – and secondly, if everyone stuck completely to the background stories, no one would write fan fiction. So, I continue - unrepentant! Okay, just a little repentant – me sowwy._

Rating: PG-13, violence, mild adult situations

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Trade Your Heroes for Ghosts**

_So. So you think you can tell Heaven from Hell? Blue skies from pain?_

_Can you tell a green field from a cold steel rail? A smile from a veil? Do you think you can tell?_

_Did they get you to trade your heroes for ghosts? Hot ashes for trees? Hot air for a cool breeze? Cold comfort for change?_

_Did you exchange a walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?_

_How I wish… how I wish you were here._

Maria moaned and turned her head. It was nearly dark and she was in pain.

"…Captain?" she whispered brokenly.

"Shhh, I am right here," Yuri replied, kneeling down beside her cot and pressing a damp cloth to her head.

Slowly, she opened her eyes against the pressure of pain that made her eyelids feel thick. She winced once against the dim lamplight, causing a flash of sharp pain across her forehead. They were in the town meeting hall that had been set up as a barracks for the Revolutionaries. And they were alone.

It was November, the onset of a deep winter in 1919. She knew the brigade was wintering here, but for some reason it seemed to surprise her, as if, while she slept, she'd forgotten where she was. What else had the fever caused her to imagine? Surely not what the Captain had said to her?

"Is Russia free yet, Captain?"

Yuri sadly shook his head. She saw a flash of something recognizable in his eyes. Their conversation of two nights ago had begun this same way. Had it been real? She closed her eyes and turned her face away from him, as if she feared perhaps it might have been, and it caused her some embarrassment.

Yuri must have noticed. "Maria…" He seemed almost contrite, as if he'd caused her grief. "I… I was serious about it. What I said the other night."

Maria's heart lurched in her chest. She turned back to look at him, her green eyes bright with her breaking fever and with hopefulness.

Two nights ago, she was falling ill. She knew it, her comrades knew it, the Captain knew it – but she was proud and stubborn and refused to let it slow her down, much less stop her.

Finally, Captain Nikolayevich took her aside. "Maria, why are you doing this to yourself?"

"I am only doing my duty, Capt—"

"I did not address you as Second Lieutenant; you do not need to address me as Captain right now. You are ill, and you need to rest. Instead, you are working even harder."

"We have been wintered here for two weeks, there is a lot of work to be done to get us on the move again before w—"

"Maria, we can prepare the army without your help for a couple of days. You are important, so do not think that I mean you are not - but we can cover for you."

"Then I am no more than luggage, Yuri – another burden and responsibility for the revolutionaries."

"I would rather tend to you for a few days than make a grave for you in a few days."

Maria muttered under her breath and turned back to strike the ice on the firewood tarp with a long stick, the task of freeing it one she'd assigned to herself. "Well, if I've outlived my usefuln—_Nn!_"

She was silenced by a kiss. Yuri had seized her by the arms, quickly spun her around and kissed her before he could second guess himself or change his mind. Maria's stick fell to the frozen cobblestones with a clatter, her eyes wide with stun.

Then he pulled her into a strong embrace, protectively. "Please do not say such things, Maria… Please. I do not know what I would do if I lost you…"

For a long moment he paused, holding her, gathering his courage. She returned his embrace, closed her eyes and buried her face in his shoulder. And then she heard him say something she'd wished so often that she had to replay the moment many times in her mind to convince herself that it had been real, and not her imagining.

"I love you."

_I love you so much…_

"Please, Maria…" a soft voice penetrated the haze of darkness and pain, a soft and gentle voice whispered to her in Russian.

Maria moaned and lifted a hand. A cool, damp cloth was held lightly against her cheek, and she laid her hand over his.

"Yuri…" she whispered through the disorientation of unconsciousness.

Abruptly, the man sitting beside her rose and stalked away. She could hear sharp footsteps cross a wooden floor. She opened her eyes.

The electric light in her New York apartment was harsh, pain stabbed at the backs of her eyes. Valentinov was pacing slowly, angrily, like a defeated lion.

Slowly, Maria assembled in her mind what had been going on. She recalled the memory that came to her in her dream. The last thing she remembered before that was encountering Patrick in the stairwell. She must have lost consciousness. She was fairly certain she'd said "Yuri" aloud. How much else had she murmured to Valentinov in her sleep?

Judging by his reactions, quite a bit. She inwardly cringed. This would not be easy. She decided that the best course of action would be to pretend that she recalled nothing at all after fainting.

"Major…?" her low whisper prompted him to stop pacing and turn toward her. Maria could almost feel his anger dissipating. She knew what he must be thinking. It was not her fault that she had called him by another name. One cannot control one's dreams any more than one can control with whom one's heart lays.

Valentinov remained silent, so Maria struggled to sit up, gripping her throbbing head. "How long have I been… like this?"

"Three hours," he answered ambivalently, drawing his pocket watch out and winding it to give his hands and eyes something upon which to focus, besides upon Maria.

She was relieved that it had not been longer. But her relief did not last long as Valentinov began the questions she did not want to answer.

"Was it Silvio?"

"Yes."

"Did he recognize you?"

"…yes and no."

"Explain."

Maria stood and walked past Valentinov to her bathroom mirror to assess the damage. She closed over the door to change back into her pinstriped suit and to clean up a bit. "He recognized that I am not a boy. He did not recognize who I am."

"But he knows someone has been following him now."

Maria closed her eyes and braced herself against the countertop. "Yes." Her voice was soft in contrition. "He does."

Valentinov launched into a fresh tirade of Russian expletives and Maria cringed, squeezing her eyes closed tightly. "Do you have any idea how much danger you have placed us all in? Who would Lupo suspect was trying to kill his bodyguard? Who else would dare besides Ignazio?"

"Major, I know…"

"And now we will all be watching our backs!"

"Major—"

"Lupo could become proactive and launch a counter attack before we even move, Second Lieutenant, I thought you were smarter than this!"

"I _know!_" Maria shouted and yanked open the bathroom door, glaring at him. "Do you think I wouldn't have prevented it if I could have? Do you think me that stupid?"

"I think you that impetuous! Inexperienced! Hesitant! You are too young, too naïve – and you always were!"

Stricken to the core, Maria was rendered speechless. She fell back a pace, her jaw open, her fist gripped in her shirt over her heart, nearly as if Valentinov had shot her. And her fingers closed around her locket under her shirt. She shook her head to clear it of the pain, like a kicked dog, and turned away from him.

Valentinov exhaled some of his rage, realizing what he'd said. He gave himself a moment to let go of the anger and then spoke softly. "Come downstairs to Luna's with me. I will buy you a drink and we can think of what to do from here."

It was as close to an apology as Maria had ever heard Valentinov make. But she, on the contrary, did not let go of her anger so easily. She stood at her window with her arms folded, and she stiffened when Valentinov put a hand on her shoulder.

"Maria. Please."

After a moment, silently, she turned and followed him downstairs, certain this time to have her long woolen black coat, her gloves, and her gun. Just in case.

Maria remembered nearly nothing of the content of the conversation between herself and Valentinov in Luna's Restaurant. Valentinov had borne most of the burden of speaking anyway. Maria was only a little disoriented from drink. Not enough to kill the pain, but as much as she would allow herself in Valentinov's company.

Valentinov lead the way back upstairs with Maria trailing morosely behind like a chastened child.

"Bozhe moy…" Valentinov whispered as they reached the third floor. Maria choked back a sob of horror.

Her door stood open, kicked half off its hinges. Her apartment had been completely ransacked. Slowly, Maria and Valentinov stepped inside. Maria's meagre belongings were not strewn around, as one might expect – they were gone. All of her belongings were gone: her money, her clothing, her makeup kit, even her hairbrush.

…even the framed photograph of Yuri.

She sank to her knees, dumbfounded.

Ineffectually, Valentinov attempted to close her unhinged door. For a long moment, he simply watched her in silence as she knelt in the middle of her empty apartment.

"Valentinov—" she whispered, voicelessly.

He knelt down beside her. There was nothing he could think of to say.

"What have I become?"

Valentinov blinked. "I don't understand." He had to lean closer and strain to hear her.

"Look at me." She was sitting back on her heels, her red gloved hands clutching her coat closed over her heart. "I am a monster."

Gently, almost hesitantly, he laid a hand on her shoulder. "No, Maria. You are just grown up."

"I am a killer."

"You are a soldier. It is no different, Maria. Someone tells you who the bad people are and you shoot them."

Ah, if only it were all that simple. Both of them knew that it was not. "Remember two months ago when I reported Bianni dead? I didn't shoot him, Major. My gun wasn't even loaded at the time."

Valentinov flinched in shock. "Are you mad? What kind of assassin doesn't load her weapon?"

"The kind who does not want to be an assassin."

For several tense moments, Valentinov considered the implications of what she'd just said. "Are you saying Bianni isn't dead?"

Maria shook her head. "He is very dead." She stood up and looked around her empty apartment, stopping at the bed. They'd even stripped her bed.

"Then you weren't the one who killed him?" Valentinov stood, too, but stayed where he was, his hands thrust deep into his pants pockets.

"Yes. I was the one who killed him."

Valentinov did not understand. He glanced down, his brows furrowed . "You regret assassinating him?"

"I did not assassinate him. I killed him – barely – because he was trying to kill me. He was trying to throw me into the Hudson." Maria's voice softened. "I simply beat him to it."

"But you fired a round… after you killed him? I remember you said you'd fired a round… you said you could smell gunpowder in your coat."

Maria laid a hand down on the countertop where Yuri's framed photo had once been. She nodded.

"At whom?"

"A boy," Maria said with the utmost regret in her voice. "A few years younger than me. Bianni's messenger."

"But he lives still…"

"For the love of God, Major! Of course he lives! Did you think me so evil and dreadful as to shoot a young child? In the BACK? As he fled from me?"

Valentinov flinched, remembering that the ambushing army that gunned down Captain Nikolayevich had done exactly that – killed dozens of young men, wounded others, as they fled. Maria herself had been shot three times while she ran away, helping another wounded man.

"I fired far over his head – just as a threat, to frighten him…" And that alone seemed to haunt the Kazuar.

Carefully, Valentinov continued, "Maria… you do realize how dangerous it is to leave witnesses, no matter how old? You cannot be sentimental. You are just doing your job."

Maria gave a mirthless, sardonic laugh. "You would make an excellent assassin, Major." She turned back to the empty countertop and but both her hands on it.

Valentinov approached. "Maria… you cannot live your entire life in regret of the past…" She closed her eyes and straightened up, her hands at her sides and her back to him.

"Captain Nikolayevich was a good man and a good soldier. He served under my command for over a year – you both did."

Maria's head bowed and Valentinov placed his hands on her shoulders. Gently, he slipped her coat off and laid it on the bed. For a moment, there he remained.

"I cannot imagine how difficult it must have been. Your family gone, your country in revolution, then to lose Yuri…" Valentinov turned to look at her again. Her back was still turned. He continued his thinly veiled torture, stepping up to her side and whispering, "And I do not believe myself mistaken to presume that Yuri was more to you than a captain…"

Maria covered her eyes with her left hand as Valentinov became relentless, his voice ever gently, ever sympathetic, ever emotional.

"He was all you had in the world. After your parents died… And then to be involved in battle after battle – you never had the chance to be young."

Valentinov delicately swept back Maria's hair from her eyes, and it promptly slipped forward again. Maria remained frozen where she was, half turned away from him, her gloved hands tightening into fists.

"Now everything you had of your former life is gone – everything. And yet you remain strong. From where I stand beside you," he lightly slipped an arm around her shoulders, "I can feel how much it aches, how much of a terrible burden it must be for one solitary girl to bear…"

Maria choked and hid her face in her hands. Valentinov swept her into an embrace which was both protective and possessive.

"Shhh, it's all right, Maria… it will be all right. I promise you." He stroked her hair gently, soothing her silent tears. "It is time to forget the past, to say farewell to your memories. Forget about hopes to change the world, to save Russia's destitute and poor – there will always be poor people, Maria, but you are one girl, you cannot save them all. Save yourself, Maria – for the sake of those who lov—who care about you. And if you cannot… let me save you."

Surprised, Maria lifted her tear-stained face to him, as if suddenly realizing the game Valentinov was playing, and how completely she'd fallen for it.

Valentinov didn't give up, though. "Let me make the future over again for you, Maria. Forget Russia. Forget Yuri—"

"No," she whispered, looking away from him and attempting to disentangle herself from his clingy embrace.

Valentinov gripped her by the upper arms in renewed urgency. "Maria, I love you!"

"No!" she cried, wrenching free from his grip and turning to run out her door. Valentinov spun her back around by the shoulders and kissed her, holding her close to him. Maria tried to push him away to no avail. She drew her gun from her shoulder holster and struck him a glancing blow to the temple. He yelped in surprise and pain, releasing her.

Disregarding her winter coat, she turned and ran out the door.

* * *


	11. 11: It's Been a Long Time, Patrick

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13, language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – It's Been a Long Time, Patrick**

This is one messed up game Valentinov is playing. But he's paying me well, so I can't complain. Actually, I can't complain because he'd sooner kill me than blink.

I stop at the top of the stairs and sit down. Four trips up the 'discreet' back stairs and I'm done. I can hear Cavaradossi huffing as he makes his last climb, too. He drops a canvas duffel bag beside me and I hear the sound of glass shatter.

I cringe. "Easy, ya big ox."

"What for? I say we make a bonfire."

"Ya don't get paid ta think."

"Yeah? Well, neither do you."

"An' that's why ya don' hear me makin' suggestions, see? Ya jus' see me doin' what I'm told ta do. Weird as it freakin' might be." Cav's gonna get himself killed one of these days with all that independent thought. Besides, Valentinov's motive is obvious. Creating a little dependency. Creepy, but obvious.

"Why the Douglas-Stewart Corporation?"

"The hell should I know?" I snap. He's beginning to bug me with all these questions.

"Yeah, well, this old building gives me the creeps. What do they do here, anyway?"

"It's a factory, dumbass. They make stuff. Machines, I guess. I dunno, somethin'."

"I thought they were one of the companies pitching defense weapons for the war."

"So what if they are?" It's more than me just wanting to keep my nose clean. I legitimately do not want to know everything that's going on. I don't want to know how Douglas-Stewart is involved. I don't want to know what ulterior motives everyone has. It's scary and I just want to get paid. And Cav won't shut the hell up.

"Jus' curious who the orders came from, is all. You know, to store dis stuff here."

"From Joseph." I stand up and pull out a cigarette.

"Yeah, but who told HIM to tell us that?"

"Jeezis, Cav, who the hell cares? Jus' take that bag in, would ya? I wanna go home before I go gray."

"Awright, awright…"

Cavaradossi's footsteps grow quieter down the dim hall, and my matchstick flares bright for a couple of seconds before dimming to the orange glow of my cigarette.

Suddenly, a hiss that sounded like a muffled steam release came from the other end of the corridor. My cigarette is stuck to my bottom lip – that's the only reason it hasn't' fallen out of my open mouth.

It's dark down there, and I'm sure Cav went the other way. "…Cav?"

He doesn't answer. But there's another sound. A soft gear-clacking sound, like something winding.

Then silence.

All the hair on the back of my neck is standing up. On my arms, too. And is it cold in here?

There's no one in the building except the night watchman downstairs, and he's in the part time employ of the boss, if ya get my meaning. O no one could be up here but us. Even if Vinnie downstairs was playing both sides, whatever made those noises wouldn't be friendly to us.

"Cav!" I whisper as loud as I can, as if it would make only Cav hear me. "Getcher ass out here!"

A soft chuckle from down the hall seems to find its way only to my ears. It is a strange, high-pitched, childlike sound… and it whispers my name.

That's it. I'm outta here. I practically fly down the stairs, amazed that my feet stay under me.

Panting, Cav comes out of the stairwell and meets me in the street.

"What the hell's gotten into you? You look like someone just walked over your grave."

I must be pale, I feel colder than this March midnight. "You didn't hear nothing'? While you was droppin' off the last load? Like… gears an' shit? Or… like a voice?"

Cav looks at me like I might be ill. "Nothin'. Mebbe we oughta get you a drink."

"Yeah."

I have no idea what I heard. Right now, I'm wondering if I'm not in Hell with all the weird and creepy shit that's been going on the past few months.

There is no way I'll be able to sleep tonight.

* * *


	12. 12: Unbreakable

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and

Rating: PG-13, violence/horror

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Unbreakable**

Even though she was no longer dressed as the boy who was tailing Silvio – in fact, those clothes had been stolen along with everyone else, by she could not imagine whom – Maria still did not feel completely safe out alone this late, the same day she was caught by Silvio. The hope that was keeping her walking at the moment was that it was too soon for Lupo's gang to react.

Two hours ago, she'd fled her apartment, leaving Valentinov staggering and cursing in pain. Valentinov was becoming terrifying. He'd said he loved her, but that could not be love. Obsession, perhaps, but not love. And the longer Maria denied him, the greater the chance of him becoming enraged enough to truly do her harm. How this had not been clear to her sooner, she did not know. Perhaps she truly did believe herself unlovable.

She did not want to go home – not to an empty flat with a broken and unlockable door. She would have to go there eventually, she knew – she had nowhere else to go and no one else to go to. But for now, that was not completely true.

She left a message with Mama Luna for Piotr Karpov, asking him to meet her under the footbridge in Central Park. It was generally a place for lovers to meet, so it tended to be dark, quiet and undisturbed. They would not be found there.

Piotr was a good man and a good soldier. Maria had known him for three years. Though despite the length of time she knew him, she did not know him very well. He, like herself, was quite reticent, stoic, silent and brooding. However there was something about him that made Maria believe that he would step in front of a speeding train to save her, and any of their fellow Revolutionaries. It had been a great source of pain to Karpov, as it had to Maria, that he had survived and his comrades had all died. Maria would not typically ask Piotr Karpov for help, but she was swiftly arriving at the end of her rope.

Karpov's apartment was two doors down from Maria's. The two of them were the only 'employees' of Giuseppe Ignazio who lived above Luna's Restaurant. Perhaps he'd heard something – anything – that might give her a hint as to who robbed her, and why. She could understand if someone had taken the money. Everyone needs money. She even understood someone taking her clothes. Times were difficult, and people needed clothing. Her bedclothes… that was a bit strange, but not outlandish. But who would take the time and trouble to steal things such as a keepsakes book, her makeup kit, her toothbrush, Yuri's photograph… Well, she understood the theft of two bottles of vodka, it was only two months ago that Prohibition had gone into effect. Alcohol was very difficult to come by now. Valentinov carried a flask in his coat at all times. Maria was now 'dry.' And at a VERY bad time.

She would have been on time to meet him, they had agreed to meet at eleven at night, but several of Lupo's lackeys were hanging around the downtown gate to the park and Maria had to go a long way around. She was almost thirty minutes late when she finally could make out Karpov's shadowy silhouette sitting at the base of a tree near the path, his back to her.

She felt a twinge of guilt – she'd made the former soldier wait for so long that he had sat down. Then the guilt became apprehension. Maria could remember Karpov standing guard for hours without faltering. Why would he need to sit after only thirty minutes?

She closed her right hand around the handle of her Enfield, tucked into its holster under her right arm, and slowly approached.

"Piotr?" she whispered.

When he did not answer, she touched his shoulder. Karpov slid away from the tree and collapsed to the ground, his eyes wide and fixed in his head, unseeing. His throat had been slit from ear to ear. The grass and cobblestones were soaked in his blood.

Maria's gasp of horror was staunched by the hand she clamped over her mouth in an effort to maintain silence. She took a step back, shaking her head in disbelief, her hand still over her mouth. Then she glanced quickly around, almost expecting someone to leap out at her.

She drew her gun. Well, at least now she believed she knew why Lupo's gang had been this far uptown. How they had known where Karpov would be meeting her, she had no idea. Her survival instincts kicked in. Someone knew the two of them would be here. And someone had killed one of them. Odds were good that they meant to kill the other one, too.

She turned and took the highest path through the grass and trees toward the West Side gate of Central Park, then scaled the wall rather than coming out to the street via the gate. As she ran, she wracked her brain for a plan. Uptown. Out of Little Italy territory. But then where?

She had literally nothing but the clothes on her back. And she would NOT sell her gun. She could no longer go to Karpov, he was quite dead. Tears for him would have to wait. She was afraid to go to Valentinov, but she was swiftly realizing that there was no where else for her to go. She felt herded along her path, and that enraged her.

When she stopped to catch her breath, she realized she was in front of the apartment building uptown in which Joseph Ignazio lived. She had been to his apartment once or twice with Valentinov and Karpov. Perhaps she had one other option after all.

* * *

Joseph opened his door in a silk robe and lined leather slippers, squinting blearily into the corridor, sleepy eyes dazzled by the fragmented light of the Austrian crystal chandelier. In the corridor, on the Oriental runner carpet, stood Maria, wearing her pin striped suit and red gloves, her gun DRAWN, but her arms folded, shivering so hard that her teeth were chattering. 

"Maria…?" he mispronounced her name, as usual. "It's after 1:00 in the morning…"

Softly, apologetically, she interrupted, "Have... Have nowhere else to go..."

"It's all right, c'mon in." Joseph let her pass him, then peered out into the corridor to be certain no one else was there.

Joseph made sure there was a generous glass of vodka in Maria's shaking hands before he left her alone to dress more appropriately. When he returned, he asked her to explain what had happened.

In moments of duress, Maria's English became abominable. Frequently, Joseph either had to exercise extreme patience, or make suggestions of possible words she could be searching for in order to help her along. Throughout her story, he was appropriately horrified, grieved and sympathetic. When she was done, he stood and took his wallet out of his inside jacket pocket.

"_Ahie, nyet… pazhowlusta_… Joseph…" she tried to stop him as he took ten dollars from his wallet.

"I insist," he thrust the money at her. "I'm only sorry it isn't more, but at least I can keep you sheltered and fed until we get all of this sorted-- …who is in there, by the way?"

He asked because Maria had folded her locket into her hands, nervously, clutching it as if it were the only thing she had left of value in the world.

"Hn? Oh…" She tucked her locket into her shirt and shook her head, her eyes still distant and her gaze still overwhelmed. "Is… only someone who… I wish… to be here, now."

Joseph sighed, nodding, and sat down beside her on his couch, leaning his elbows on his knees and joining her in staring off into nothingness. He knew who was in her locket. He knew the whole story. He knew a surprising lot, as a matter of fact. "Look, Maria… I think I can help you solve this."

She looked up at him, questioningly.

"It won't be easy, but it might solve a few of your problems at once. How good are you with that revolver?"

Instinctively, she placed her right hand over it, as if he might take it from her merely by mentioning it. "Am…" she appeared to consider appraisingly, her gaze heavenward, then met his eyes again. "Excellent."

"Good. You will likely need it often. Shall I tell you your first difficulty?"

Maria looked a little surprised.

"You are a poor judge of character. Valentinov is not your friend."

She huffed a mirthless laugh. "I know this."

"I'm not sure you do. I mean, it's obvious that you're guarded around him, and you try to keep someone between you and him at all times, and that's smart. But you're skipping the most important part, Maria."

She turned her empty glass in her hands, just as something to do. Joseph took it as a hint and stood, taking the glass from her and going to his baptist bar to refill it. "Think back to Russia. Think back to the day of the ambush."

Maria squeezed her eyes closed. She did _not_ want to think back to that day. She'd spent the better part of her days since trying to never think of it again, trying to never dream of it, trying to escape the grasping ghosts of her wailing comrades, their corpses littering the snowfield around her—

"It would have been a different story that day if your numbers had been a little greater, wouldn't it? If Valentinov had showed up, you would have fended off that ambush, wouldn't you?"

She nodded, her eyes still closed.

"Lemme see if I remember this right. Your regiment is summoned to rendezvous with Valentinov's, right? So you guys get there, only there's no Valentinov and no regiment. Instead, an army is lying in wait, and they slaughter you all. Still no Valentinov, right?"

Again, Maria nodded, wincing against the echoes of gunfire in her memory, the hollow sound of Yuri commanding them to retreat…

"Why do you think he was not at the rendezvous point, Maria? Have you ever known him to be so forgetful?"

All the explanations she'd come up with herself surfaced: they'd been attacked, but no one was wounded. They were snowed in, but there was no storm. They were needed elsewhere, but there was no battle. She'd lied to herself to avoid considering the unthinkable.

"Haven't you ever wondered why he didn't tell you the reason for missing the rendezvous? Or were you too busy wallowing in grief and self pity?"

Sharply, Maria rose to her feet, glaring at him angrily.

"You were so preoccupied idealizing the dead guy in your locket that you haven't noticed the traitor in your midst."

"_Govnyuk…_" Maria whispered, and raised a hand to slap him across the face. He caught her wrist and stood too, facing her.

"I'm harsh, true. But you'd better reconsider your anger, Maria. Right now… I'm your only friend."

She exhaled, still furious, and expected to be released. He did not release her.

"No. I know you're just like the other Russians are. Were. Nothing inside, and walk away when wounded, pace furiously, get absorbed in yourself, but this is important, and you're going to look me in the eyes when I tell it to you."

She was, in fact, remarkably uncomfortable with the proximity and the eye contact – as if he could see her soul, a part of her she wished to keep hidden.

"Silvio knows someone is trying to kill him. And the bottom line is, he knows it's us. More to the point, he knows it's you, Maria. And he knows you'll be after Lupo next."

All the colour drained from Maria's face and she staggered. Joseph pulled the wrist he held to keep her on her feet. "No, hey – don't panic. Now's the time to be ice cold again. I told you I had a solution for you."

He gave Maria a moment to muster every ounce of strength she could and compose herself.

"Skip a step. Forget Silvio, leave him to me. Go straight to Lupo. And do it as fast as you can."

Maria opened her mouth to protest, but Joseph interrupted her.

"You have no lead time, so forget about that. He needs to be dead in days, Maria. Your apartment's been ransacked, so now you can probably guess what Lupo and his gang know about you. Stay away from your usual restaurants. Don't go home. Not until Lupo's dead. And for God's sake, don't come here."

This was too much. Everything was happening so quickly, and all of it was so dangerous… there was no way she could survive it. She had nothing, she had no one. And she was hunted. Hunted by the other guys, and by her own. Maria saw her future shrink before her eyes. She felt broken, numb, like someone simply waiting to expire. She would not live through this.

"Go now. Use that money I gave you. Find a youth hostel or something. Stay low. When you're settled, send me a telegram and tell me where we can meet tomorrow night. I'll have more answers for you, then."

_

* * *

Russian Glossary:_

_Ahie, nyet… pazhowlusta_ – Ah, no… please

_Govnyuk_ - Bastard


	13. 13: The Enemy of My Enemy

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS, MARIA TACHIBANA, and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13, language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – The Enemy of My Enemy**

"Here's what I don't understand…"

Here we go again. It's a windy but warm late March morning and Cav is playing strategist again. I don't bother to hide the exasperated sigh. It won't deter him anyway.

"I don't get what Lupo's issue with the Russians is. I mean, why do we gotta get them outta the picture?"

There aren't many people on the street, but Cav isn't trying to be secretive at all. It's that un-subtle thing again.

"Cav. Look." I stop at the corner. "You seem to keep thinking I know something. I don't know." I lower my voice. "I don't know why Joseph killed Karpov and not the Kazuar. I don't know if Valentinov will be spared because of his cousin who used to be the boss around here. I don't know what Douglas-Stewart has to do with anything. I don't know if the boss approves of what his nephew is doing for power. I don't know if Valentinov has the balls to kill the Kazuar, and I don't know if he's good enough. And most of all, I don't know WHAT the hell happened in the factory last night."

That silences him effectively for the rest of the walk to Vermicelli's, a little restaurant uptown where we're all meeting for lunch.

Cav's a little miffed, and I have to admit, I'm feeling a little guilty for snapping at him. After all, he's got good instincts. He can tell I know something and I'm not letting on. And he's right. I lied to him. About the only part of what I just said that was true was the last bit. I have no idea what was up with the voice in the factory. The rest? Well.

We're the last two to arrive at the restaurant, but we're not late. Everyone else is early. Giuseppe stands and starts introductions. He introduces me to the man I've been working for under the table for six months. Just for the sake of pretending we've never met, I mispronounce his name. "Afternoon, Mister Furlone."

"Fur_long_," he corrects me.

Cav is looking at me. I can tell he's trying to figure me out, so I quickly look to our other two guests, whom Joseph Ignazio introduces, despite the fact that Lupo and Silvio need no introduction here.

I'm on my guard. I know this because I don't remember what I ordered to eat. I'm avoiding looking at Brent. I have to force myself to look at him while he's talking.

"You think me too ambitious, Mr. Ignazio," Furlong's tone is flippant. He doesn't give a shit what Giuseppe thinks. "Your nephew would disagree with you, I believe."

"My nephew has had the benefit of a full explanation."

"Then I shall grant you no less than the same, Mr. Ignazio."

"Please," the boss leans back, opening his hands amicably. "If we're going to do business, call me Giuseppe."

Brent smiles at the gesture. "I am not trying to take over the world. I leave that dubious distinction to the demons which nearly destroyed Tokyo 20 years ago. On the contrary, I propose a weapon that wou—"

"Japan is already developin' such measures to protect themselves in the eventuality of a recurrence, if ya know what I mean," Lupo interrupts Brent. His voice is thin and medium in pitch, adding verisimilitude to his wolf-like demeanour. He also likes to use big words to seem impressive, despite the fact that half the time he's not certain the meaning of the words he's using. Or misusing.

Brent waits for Lupo to finish, even though Lupo had interrupted him. Lupo continues, "Big rigs of steam-powered armour to be driven by soldiers."

"And Japan has already lost three soldiers to experiments with their so-called 'spirit armour,'" Brent adds a note of regret to his voice. "Japan may consider this to be an acceptable loss, Mister Lupo; however, what I have in mind is a bit more humane. No human life will be at risk."

"Impossible!" Cav can _never_ keep his mouth shut. What Brent proposes is not impossible in fact. A little scary, but not impossible.

"I intend to prove otherwise, Mister Cavaradossi."

"Can you prove it now?" Silvio is ever clinical, his soft voice catching our attention.

"No," Brent answers honestly. "We lack funds, facilities, testing, and… if you will… there are certain… regulations… which stand to oppose us. We have concepts, a prototype and plans. You should have received a proposal, Mister Lupo, Giuseppe."

"Yes," the boss answers, and Lupo nods, taking his out of the black leather briefcase at the side of his chair. "And I have to admit, it is impressive. I have one question. You stipulated that the Russians must not be involved in these negotiations. Why?"

"Of course. I am grateful, incidentally, that you have complied with my request and kept Valentinov from this meeting, despite my lack of an explanation beforehand."

Giuseppe gestures magnanimously. The boss is charming, but Brent is exponentially more charismatic, the epitome of a suave and classy salesman.

"Major Valentinov and his soldiers have no known ties to the Russian army any longer, but I am being overly cautious. Russia has already spoken to the council in Japan regarding building some of their weaponry for them inside Russia. I wish to keep the current and future efforts of Douglas-Stewart private from any… lingering Russian loyalties."

Giuseppe nods sagely, buying it hook, line and sinker. Brent is lying. Russia is far too busy with the abdication of the czar and its economy in a speeding tailspin to do anything like propose to make weapons for some _other_ country.

Cav still can't shut up. "Yeah, well, ya don't ever have to worry about one of the three Russians again."

Brent covers his alarm well. But I know what he's worried about, and I explain for him. "A tiff between him and Valentinov."

I used the word 'him' and that was enough to reassure Brent that the girl, in whom he is highly interested, is not dead. It takes him the space of half a breath to process the new information and use it to his advantage.

"Ah. I see. Well, that is one more reason to keep our dealings from the two remaining Russians, if the in-fighting causes them to behave in such an impulsive manner. Russians are primitive and hot-headed, and the complexities of the business would be beyond them, anyway. I prefer to keep my business restricted to those with the ability to command themselves logically, at the very least." Here Brent flashes a charming smile at Lupo and the boss, clearly displaying that he believes the likes of them to be superior to most other simple human creatures. Flattery will get you everywhere in the Mafia.

"Agreed," Silvio replies and Lupo nods.

Lupo takes over the conversation in favour of his gang. "Wit' the two families united, Mr. Furlong, New York is yours."

"And yours, gentlemen," Brent is certain to add. "Remember the profit involved for each investor as I detailed in my proposal. And of course, the two of you," he makes eye contact with the boss and then with Lupo, "will be on the Board of Directors for this project."

* * *

The meeting went better than we'd expected. All papers were signed on the first try. We're a go to start finding facilities. Cav was dropped off first and I'm fumbling for my key in front of my apartment door when it opens from the inside. 

"Ah!"

"Hello, Patrick."

It's Brent. I exhale. "Jeezis. You scared the daylights outta me."

"I apologize. Please come in."

I narrow my eyes at him. It's _my_ apartment, after all. "Gee, I think I will."

"I am sorry for arriving unannounced, but I wished to see what you thought of our little luncheon."

"Yeah, it was good." I toss my keys onto the hall table and wander into my living room, flopping onto a couch.

"Insightful," Brent smiles. "I am so glad I waited a half an hour to discover that."

"Christ, Brent, ya mind if I get my coat off an' take a piss before ya gimme the third degree?"

He's always been a little taken aback by my bluntness, so I try to use it as much as I can around him. He blanches. "Er… yes, how lovely. Yes, by all means, take one of those. I shall wait here."

I come back out and Brent is perched on the arm of my couch as if it was the cleanest spot he could find. There's nothing wrong or unclean about my apartment, but the couch isn't leather, and I'm sure he's used to much more opulence than I can offer. "The girl ain't dead."

"I deduced that from your use of the male pronoun. Have you witnessed any further… intriguing abnormalities… from her?"

"Nah, I ain't been around her much. Valentinov's chased her off."

Now Brent is alarmed again and sits forward. "Off? Off to where? Have you followed her?"

"Yeah, yeah, don' worry. She's at a hostel uptown. Joseph sent her there. He's on his way there now to meet with her."

He exhaled, his shoulders lowering a bit. "Excellent. Do you think she will be of assistance to you? What of your own abilities? Have they strengthened at all?"

"Shit, Brent, in a _week_? No. Besides, I been workin' so hard I ain't hardly had time ta practice."

"How can I help? I have been attempting to research Celtic magic, but, precious little is written of th—"

"Yeah, clever, ain't it? We write it down and next thing we know, half the world is playin' Merlin wit' little toy sticks and pointy hats and mistletoe. We jus' keep it in our heads. An' there ain't much you can do ta help. Except maybe explain what the hell was in the research and development wing at the factory last night."

"Besides the _Japhkiel_ prototype, you mean?"

"Yeah, something moving and whispering."

"Oh, that. Hmmm… you saw it?"

"No, jus' heard somethin'."

"Ah, good. Perhaps I will introduce you at a later time. It is what I hope will be my greatest gift of assistance to you."

* * *


	14. 14: I Won't Tell Them Your Name

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED. "NAME" is TM & © GOO GOO DOLLS.

Rating: PG-13

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – I Won't Tell Them Your Name**

It was difficult to tell what the building had once been with all its oak wood pillars and a balcony that looked like a choir loft of sorts – but it was an Irish pub now, not far from Times Square.

Vincenzo had stayed out of sight the instant he'd seen Joseph Ignazio enter with the Russian girl. They were the only two in the balcony which could not be seen from the street through the windows below. Vincenzo had seen the Russian girl on many occasions – she lived, after all, above his mother's restaurant down in Nolita. Vincenzo's English was passable, but probably no better than hers – and he'd never managed to speak to her. In fact, upon some of his mother's better advice, Vincenzo had managed to seem poorer at English than he truly was whenever Mama Luna's more… 'connected' patrons were in the restaurant. But he was an excellent silent observer.

Several things seemed curious to Vincenzo at the moment. First, neither Joseph nor the girl ever came up to this pub. If they did, surely Vincenzo or one of his Irish buddies who frequent this place would have seen them. Second, what was the boss' nephew doing meeting with the boss' assassin… alone? And third, why did the Russian girl look like she'd just lost everything?

_It's lonely where you are. Come back down._

_And I won't tell them your name._

Joseph only stayed for a half an hour. He lead the girl back down to the bar, paid for their food and drinks, then laid a hand on her shoulder as if to bolster her courage. The girl was stiff beneath his hand, her expression unchanged, it was still pale and haunted. Joseph left and the girl stayed where she was at the bar, gripping it with both hands as if it were all that kept her from drowning in the cyclonic whirlpool of events rushing around her.

Vincenzo stood from his stool near the windows and started to go to her, but she drew a breath as if she hadn't done so in some time, and turned to go to a dark table in the back corner of the pub, not having noticed someone approaching. Vincenzo exhaled and stayed at the bar where she'd been a moment ago. Now he was torn, now that he had been afforded the opportunity to reconsider by missing his opportunity to speak to her, he wasn't certain he should.

_Even though the moment passed me by, I still can't turn away._

_And all the dreams you never thought you'd lose got tossed along the way._

She started in surprise when he set a coffee mug in front of her, standing beside her table holding a second mug for himself. She blinked and her brow furrowed as she regarded him. She recognized him, that much he could tell, and she was trying to place his face.

"Vincenzo Luna," he offered, gesturing relatively downtown with his mug, "from the restaurant."

His identity dawned on her and she nodded.

"Would you let me join you?"

His accent was as thickly Italian as hers was Russian, and there were brief pauses after his utterances for her to interpret what he'd said.

"Ah… please," she opened a hand toward the chair across from her and Vincenzo took it.

"And what are you named?" he asked, amicably.

Here, the pause was longer than needed to decipher what he'd said. She was considering the wisdom of sharing this information. Something seemed to convince her that there was no harm in it.

"Maria. Maria Tachibana."

"Tachibana?" Vincenzo had been about to sip his coffee, but instead he set it down. "Japanese?"

Maria chuckled, turning her cup around in her hands and gazing into it. "Is only way how I take after mother. Father's name Dimitrovitch." She gestured to herself, as if to display her semblance, strikingly Russian and barely Japanese.

"Ah," Vincenzo nodded, chuckling. That would have been his only guess. He didn't realize she was half-blooded. Then he said something bold. "You keep… mmm… dangerous company."

Maria's smile fell away and she glanced at the windows as if afraid Joseph might still be there. "And you… know more than I thought." Then she turned back to him, holding his regard with icy green eyes.

"I watch," Vincenzo continued, openly and artlessly. "And for you, _ragazza_, I worry."

"Everyone who say that to me… is lying."

Vincenzo flinched. "Maria. I have only just now meet you, and I do not have enough words of English to lie yet." His expression was sincere. And Maria's was uncomfortable. For some reason, it seemed to Vincenzo that she was uncomfortable with someone who might NOT be an adversary. Which meant she'd been in one too many fights lately. "I do not need from you anything, and I do not work for Ignazio. _Quel'injustizia_. I only… you look… like you were alone. Too alone."

_You could hide beside me, maybe, for a while._

To break the ice, Vincenzo started. "As for me… I was born in Pavia in 1900. Papa owned a bakery. But as for me, I wanted to be a dancer. Either that or a boxer."

Maria smiled, charmed. "Is two very different…" she gave up finding the word for 'career,' and he knew what she meant anyway.

"_Si!_ But… both need to be very graceful, and I am not. Papa went to God when I was five, his heart stopped beating while he were sleeping."

"I am sorry…" she whispered, sympathetically.

Vincenzo shook his head and waved off the apology. "So, Mama and my two brothers and three sisters come here."

Quickly doing the math in her mind, Maria's jaw fell open. "SIX children!"

"_Si_, Mama had full hands."

"_Bozhe moy…"_

Vincenzo looked down before asking his next question. "You… you came alone… did you?"

"To America?" Maria's low, soft voice was scarcely more than a whisper. She nodded.

"This morning… Mama told me," he continued, not meeting her eyes again, "about Karpov, and about your flat." When Maria winced and looked down as well, Vincenzo tried to add something comforting. "She… had the door fixed…"

"Thank you," she said, almost inaudibly.

_And now we're grown-up orphans that never knew their names._

_We don't belong to no one, and that's a shame._

"Maria… I hope you do not think that… I am being too…" now it was Vincenzo's turn to search for a word, "…prying… but you seem to… be in a little… trouble." Vincenzo braced himself, expecting to be lashed out at by Maria, or to be icily glared at… and he was surprised when neither was forthcoming. In fact, he told her so. "I am sorry. I was afraid you would be angry."

"I do _nyet_ have strength… anymore… for anger." She was still focused on the black coffee in her mug, and finally she lifted it to take a sip.

"What did they done to you, Maria?"

"Vincenzo," she said, using his name for the first time, "I did it all to myself." She glanced at grandfather clock standing in the corner next to the bar. Vincenzo noticed that she'd done so several times.

"Either I am boring…" he gave a shy smile, "or you have somewhere to go."

Maria's smile in return was apologetic. "You are _nyet_ boring."

"Then where is it you have to be?"

A long sigh covered part of her deliberation again. He could tell she wasn't certain if it was wise to speak to him again, but he also knew she was intelligent. And she could appreciate secretive behaviour. And by blending into the background as much as possible, Vincenzo had avoided the spotlight. He was too inexperienced, too open to be deeply involved with the Mafia. And he wanted no more part of it than whatever he could do to help keep this girl alive. She reminded him of someone. He could not place whom, though. Perhaps he just pitied her. Maria had evidently decided that revealing at least some information to the young Mr. Luna would not harm her.

"Restaurant downtown. Below Battery Park. Is by river."

"At what time?"

"Nine."

Vincenzo glanced at the clock over his shoulder. It was 2:00pm. She had plenty of time. "You have other things to do before you get there?"

Maria shook her head.

"Then you look at the clock so much because you dread it."

Maria's eyes snapped to lock with his, surprised. Vincenzo blushed. "I apologize," he said. "I ask too much."

_We grew up way too fast, and now there's nothing to believe._

Maria exhaled and looked down. "You… are wise observer." Then she made a face. That made no sense even to her. She'd meant he was astute, clever. She could tell him so in Russian. She could probably even recall enough of her mother to compliment him in Japanese. Hell, because it was so fashionable in the 1800s to speak French in the Russian courts, Maria was even fluent in _French_. Why did she keep bumping into people who spoke all the languages she did not?

Vincenzo opened his mouth to cover the long and uncomfortable pause, but Maria spoke first. "Your mother… is good woman."

"Thank you."

"And raise good son, and wise. And careful. Do wish had fore…thought… foresight… when first come here… to keep quiet, too."

"I had a few more… choices… than you did. To stay with Mama. You had no one."

"Had Valentinov."

_And scars are souvenirs you never lose._

_The past is never far._

_Did you lose yourself somewhere out there?_

Vincenzo made a face. "He is not much better than no one." Maria chuckled at that. Then, as Vincenzo continued, her face sobered rather quickly. "I do not know what I would do, if the only person I had was a traitor."

Maria blanched. "What makes you think this?"

Vincenzo was uncomfortable again. It was difficult to avoid pushing someone's buttons when you don't know where they are. "I told you… I watch them… and they do not think I speak English."

"You heard Valentinov say this? Himself?"

Vincenzo nodded. "To Giuseppe. One night in the back of the restaurant." Vincenzo glanced at her hands. They were ungloved and wrapped tightly around the coffee mug, her sleeves pulled down far over her hands, but not quite far enough to hide her right hand. Before he could stop himself, he reached for her hand, and she jerked away.

"Please excuse me, Mister Luna," she stood abruptly, pulling on her gloves and tying the belt of her long black woolen coat, anything she could do to keep her hair curtaining her eyes. Vincenzo had not angered her with his action, that he could tell – she was reacting to the information, not to his reaching for her. He stood as well. "Is something I must… take care of."

"Please be careful, Miss Tachibana," Vincenzo whispered. She would not let him help her. Moreover, he wasn't at all sure there was anything he could do that would be of help to her. But he was fairly certain that this would be her last day of life if he didn't do anything at all. The first thing he could do, at least, was give her a direction in which to focus her vengeful anger. "Mama said she heard Giuseppe tell Valentinov to take care of something at Douglas-Stewart this afternoon…"

Maria stared at him, hard. He was helping her. Genuinely helping her. And it was foreign to her. But when she realized it, she nodded once in thanks and turned to go.

She might never see him again, and he might never see her. And she might never know everything his observances had saved her from over the course of her months living in New York. But he didn't need her to know. He didn't need to see her. He just needed to help.

_I think about you all the time, but I don't need the same._

_It's lonely where you are. Come back down. And I won't tell them your name._

He watched as she strode out the door into the March wind, her glare sharper than the cold. He waited only a moment until he ran off, too, in the direction of his mother's restaurant.

_**

* * *

Foreign Language Dictionaries:**_

_Ragazza_ – Italian for "girl"

_Quel'injustizia_ – Italian for "How unjust."

_Si!_ – Italian for "Yes!"

_Bozhe moy…_ - Russian for "My god…"


	15. 15: The World of Adults

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13/R_- LANGUAGE, VIOLENCE, ADULT SITUATIONS_.

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – The World of Adults**

No, I'm not a friggin' sorcerer, if that's what you're thinking. Well, actually, I guess I am, if you're not creative enough to think of a less archaic term.

I was born in Kilkenny, Ireland, and lived there until I was fifteen. For as long as I can remember, I've been able to see and hear things that most other people not only couldn't see and hear, but didn't even believe existed.

One old lady who lived up on the hill at the north end of my town, she did believe me. And when I was ten years old, she agreed to teach me a little bit of control over my rather unusual abilities. And from that, I was able to extrapolate and learn a bit of control – or should I say command? – over those things I could see and hear.

That's the problem with the Kazuar. No one ever believed her or taught her. Her power over the element of Water still scares her half to death. And if everyone reacted to it all her life the way we reacted to it the night she froze the water glass, it's no wonder she doesn't talk about it or acknowledge it.

I'm focusing now on the cracked picture frame with the soldier in it.

"Name was Yuri-Mikha—"

"Shh!"

Valentinov is standing just inside the closed door behind me. I'm sitting cross-legged on the floor in one of the empty offices of the Douglas-Stewart Building – the room where we dumped all of the Kazuar's stuff.

I think it is a bad idea to bring Valentinov here, especially if there's any chance of him figuring out what we're doing and why we want the girl. But Brent wants him to confirm what I find as a test of my skill, and whatever Brent's using to augment my ability won't work if I leave the building. So here we are.

"…Nikolayevich." I finish the name he started telling me before I could figure it out for myself.

Valentinov blinks in surprise. "_Da_… Nikolayevich… How did y—"

"Whaddaya think I was kiddin'?" I close my eyes again and grip the frame of the picture again, keeping my fingers away from the glass Cav cracked when he brought the duffel up. "Sandy blonde hair, tall and thin…"

Valentinov huffs. "You holding his photograph! This you could see with your eyes!"

"Shaddup, it's slow in startin', awright?"

Valentinov approaches gingerly and I manage a slightly altered state of consciousness. My face relaxes and an image begins to form behind my eyes. I can tell I'm talking, though softly. I'm telling Valentinov what I'm seeing and hearing, but almost all my attention is on the images, not on this world at all, and certainly not on what I'm saying.

Oddly, I'm not seeing Nikolayevich. I _am_ Nikolayevich. All the images are from the first person perspective, as if I am inside his body. In reality, he is probably inside mine at the moment. Or at least, his memories are. I'm seeing the girl, the Kazuar, through his eyes. She is much younger. _Much_ younger. The past four years have aged her dramatically. She's wearing a dusky rose-coloured wool coat trimmed in white rabbit fur. Her fuzzy mittens are gripped around the handle of a handgun. Her back is to me – to Nikolayevich. His hand is on her shoulder.

"Relax," he tells her, "your grip is too stiff."

My feet are cold. I am used to the feeling. The girl's name is Maria. Maria Tachibana. Her father was important. She is trembling, but not with the cold, she is afraid.

_**BANG!**_

One of the tin cans set in the snowdrift is blown backwards by her bullet.

"Excellent!"

They are speaking in Russian. I hear Nikolayevich's voice inside my head. Somehow, I can understand them.

The scene fades, replaced with the sound of a whispered warning in Russian.

My heart starts pounding. My breath plumes into mist in the cold, snow-filled air. I am wearing mittens with the index finger separated so I can still get my finger into the trigger of my bayoneted rifle.

Through the fog and snow, across the field, I can make out several large shadows through my darkly tinted glasses. Tanks. And at that moment, I know beyond knowing that we are going to die. We are on foot. We cannot face down the tanks.

Time seems to slow to a crawl. The sound of my own breathing is torturously loud. I turn and look back at my men. And my girl. Suddenly I feel sick with desperation.

I was selfish. Maria would die because I wanted her to be near me. If only I had sent her away when things started to get dangerous…

I love her. More than anything else, more than the preservation of my life. My men are prepared to die by my side, but my desire to save Maria is most of what motivates my decision – something I will never admit, even to myself.

"RETREAT!" I scream, my voice breaking over the desperation. Gunfire has begun.

A cry of pain from one of my men. I turn and see Maria kneeling beside him. "Are you all right?" she whispers to him and takes his arm to help him up.

My heart aches for her, longs for her. I know I will never see her again.

_Maria's eyes are gleaming like emeralds, her face is alight. She is holding a paper target in her mittened hands, and she is beaming. She is proud of herself. And the first person she needs to tell is me. And of all the things I have accomplished in my life thus far, I am pleased with nothing more than with that. She holds up the target, a large hole torn through the exact center by at least three bullets. Dimitrovich's daughter is a paradox – the voice of an angel when she chooses to sing, and the aim of a demon when she chooses to kill._

The soldier allows Maria to haul him to his feet and she pulls his arm supportingly around her neck.

_Maria is stubborn. She is so sick that she is flushed with fever, and still she seeks something to do. She has tried to tell me for months what she feels, tried to be everything she believes I expect of her, and I can think of only one way to show her that she is more than I could ever have dreamed. She drops her stick in surprise, and I will regret this when I release her, but for now I can do nothing but kiss her._

Another cry of pain, this time it is Maria's. She grips her side with her hand as she and the soldier she was supporting stumble to their knees. A bullet has ripped clean through the side of her coat, leaving a long cut. That means it cannot have gone deep, if it even cut her at all. Thank God…

"Second Lieutenant!" I repeat my command, urgently. "RETREAT!"

"But, Captain--!"

_I am the luckiest man in the world. I must be. I know it is a privilege, lying here with her in my arms, holding her safely until I can see the tent roof brightening with a dawn I am begging not to come. Her face is so peaceful when she sleeps, no grief or worry creasing a brow too young to bear such burdens. She is so young, she should not carry such sorrow. I lightly brush my fingers through her hair, smoothing it back from her face. If I can do anything for this precious girl, I will make Russia a better place than the one in which our parents died._

"Maria! Please! Get the men out of here! I will lead the enemy away!"

"No, Captain!" There are tears in her eyes. She knows as well as I do that we will not both live through this. "Come with us, please!"

"RETREAT!" Someone at the back of the ranks echoes my command, and I give Maria my stoniest gaze through my dark glasses. I can actually _see_ her heart breaking.

_Her hair smells beautiful, fresh and cold, almost like the air smells when it is going to snow. I never wish to forget how it feels to have her head resting on my chest, to see her smile and hear her whisper that she can count the beating of my heart. I will never forget the soft sound of her breathing as she sleeps in my arms, the small sound of protest she makes as she begins to wake, tightening her arms around me as if angry with the dawn for coming to separate us._

"I've given you an _order_, Second Lieutenant!" my voice is cracking with grief, but I must maintain command of myself, for her sake if nothing else. "Get your soldiers out of here!" Her soldiers. Not mine. When I am gone, they will be hers.

"But—"

_"**NOW, DAMN IT!"**_

"_It's morning," I whisper to her and she moans in dismay, burying her face in my shoulder and curling under the stiff and wretched wool blankets of the army. I return the embrace, tightly, and then try to disentangle us again._

"_No…" she sighs and clings to me. _

_How can I resist that? I smile and stroke her hair, and whisper to her. "Maria, come on, we are meeting Major Valentinov's regiment today. Come… before the rest of the regiment wakes."_

"_I don't want to hide from them, Yuri…" she sits up and holds the sheet to her chest, not quite pouting. She never pouts. But she looks just sullen enough to wring my heart out._

"FALL BACK!" one of the lieutenants cries. "FALL BA—" and then he will cry no more. The manner in which he fell, forward onto his face, with his arms at uncomfortable angles, makes it clear that he will never rise again.

Maria does not turn back. And I'm certain it's taking most of her courage not to do so. She stumbles once more, bringing the soldier down with her again. From the way she moved and cried out, she'd been shot a second time. When she stands, she is limping, favouring her right leg.

They are killing her. These bastards are killing the one I hold most dear, little piece at a time.

If I look at her for one more moment instead of at the enemy, I will not buy her an escape. With a growl of rage, I turn and run _toward_ the tanks. I hear Maria's cry behind me. I pull the pin from a grenade and pause to hurl it with all my strength toward one of the tanks.

Before the first grenade explodes, I am already pulling the pin on a second one. And that's all I'll have time for.

Just as I'm turning to run and follow our retreat, I realize something so clearly that I nearly miss a step.

The tanks are marked with the emblem of the Russian regiment Major Valentinov had once mentioned to me. The commander of this regiment had met with Valentinov – according to Valentinov – in order to negotiate a stipulated cease-fire with some of the Revolutionaries. And Valentinov was the one who arranged the rendezvous with us, here.

Valentinov had betrayed us to the enemy. Maria!

I turn to run toward her. She is lying on her stomach in the snow. I don't know where the soldier she was helping is now. She is dragging herself back through the snow, leaving a trail of blood behind her, trying to reach her rifle, which she apparently dropped. Her right mitten is soaked in blood, and I deduce that her gun must have been shot from her hand. I can see the blood as she reaches her right hand toward me, her eyes no longer on her weapon.

"**_CAPTAIN!_**"

I feel an excruciating pain in my chest as Captain Yuri-Mikhail Nikolayevich is torn open from behind by half a dozen bullets or more.

I drop the picture frame and clutch my chest. I open my eyes and rise up onto my knees to turn and glare at Valentinov.

"_Predatel!_" I yell, and then later realize what language I'd said it in. Valentinov's eyes widen in surprise and he takes a step back from me.

"Wh-what are you talking about, Patrick?" he stammers in English.

…Patrick.

I stagger and grimace, putting a hand to my head. Valentinov takes my arm to steady me.

"S-sorry…" I breathe as he guides me to a chair. "Kinda… Kinda clingy, that memory…"

"Is all right…" but Valentinov looks a little shaken.

"So'd I do okay?" I grin slyly at him.

"Exactly accurate," he whispers as if I'd discovered some great mystery. A bit too much awe for my taste.

"That was some serious shit, Valentinov. Did you really betray that army?"

Valentinov exhales a long, slow breath of cigarette smoke in a hiss and turns to stand at the window. He runs a hand through his gray hair, then tips his head to one side, then the other, popping his stiff neck. "Revolutionaries never had chance of winning," he begins. I can tell this will likely be a long confession, so I start bagging up Maria's stuff again.

The Kazuar. Not Maria.

I try to shake the last remnants of Nikolayevich's memories from my mind, feeling a little embarrassed, like I'd just walked in on them making love. Which, in a spiritual sense… I sort of did. I'd seen, heard, felt everything Nikolayevich felt for Mar—the Kazuar, and the recovery from that is being a little slow. It was just a little more intimate than spiritual memories usually are. Intense.

Valentinov's continuing his story, and I continue shoving the Kazuar's things into a duffel bag.

"That army… promised… overlook my crimes against Czar. And that of all regiment. If I help to defeat Revolutionaries."

"So ya got threatened. That's rough." I stuff a blue blouse into a duffel and pack it down hard so I can tie it off. Hopefully I don't sound too much like I don't give a shit.

"Not threatened." Valentinov tosses the stub of his cigarette to the floor and slides his hands into his pockets, curtaining back the jacket of his sage green designer Italian suit. "Bought."

"Ya sold out? Huh. Interestin'. Hey, toss me dat bottle'a brandy, wouldya?"

Valentinov's always looked real sharp and snazzy for a Major in an army of treasonous Revolutionaries, even before he came to his cousin's kingdom in New York. His hair's always in perfect condition, his goatee always expertly trimmed. His shoes are always shined and his pants are always pressed and tailored to a perfect length. His cigars are all Cuban and his vodka is all Russian. His cashmere scarf is driven-snow white. The Russian army set this guy up good for leading them to Nikolayevich's regiment.

Valentinov comes over to hand me the bottle I asked for. I pour the full contents over the three tightly-packed duffel bags. I managed to get all her stuff into three bags. I sling two of them over my shoulder and Valentinov picks up the third bag, holding it by the drawstrings at his side so that only his fingers need touch the brandy-soaked bag. "You are certain Maria has no idea... what happened that day?"

"Not that I could see." I almost ask Valentinov if he's sure he wants to do this, since he looks a little tormented at the moment. But then, I'm beginning to suspect that's just how Russian people look.

I follow him down to the boiler room and prop open the door to the back alley for some air flow as Valentinov strikes a match and tosses it onto the three duffel bags we've dumped into the incinerator.

The fire is soon big enough to spill orange-yellow light into the alley. It's nearly 6:00pm and it's already dark outside. For a moment, I wonder if anyone will see the flames, but the only other building that looks out into this alley is an office, and it closed for the night an hour ago. Besides, Douglas-Stewart incinerates trash back here all the time. A fire won't seem like anything strange.

Still, there's no mistaking the click of the hammer being cocked on an Enfield Mark 1 customized Star Revolver.

"_Hooo-leeee shit…"_ I turn around.

In the doorway, like death itself, stands the Kazuar, framed by snow and darkness, with the reflected firelight flashing in her narrowed green eyes.

She knows I'm here, but her glare is focused on Valentinov and her gun is aimed at him. For his part, Valentinov looks completely unconcerned. And I gotta admit, that's impressive, because here's me trying not to shit myself.

"Maria," he smiles and spreads his arms as if he is expecting a hug. In his right hand is a cigarette and a match. He walks _toward_ her, utterly ignoring the gun barrel down which he is staring. He strikes his match on the doorframe and lights his cigarette.

"Let us do what is polite… and take outside with this, _da_?" He gestures her to back up, and at first, she doesn't move. Then the Kazuar takes a step backward haltingly, her gun still trained on Valentinov, backing out into the alley. Valentinov tips his cigarette at me and gives me the barest of sideward glances as he follows the Kazuar outside.

I get the message clear enough: Kill her. _Damn it!_ This is exactly what Brent wanted to avoid. He'd been researching the 'talent' in three countries for two years and had found only this girl, one other girl and a boy. Of the three, only this one was still alive. Having talents like we do tends to get a person killed by the opportunistic, the greedy, and the very frightened.

Nevertheless, I couldn't see another way out without risking myself. I'd let the Russians kill each other, but if the Kazuar shoots first, she'll get me next. If Valentinov shoots first, I'll have to answer to him why I didn't follow instructions. And he's just as likely to kill me. I'm too important to Brent for him to let me die. I drop the sixth bullet into the cartridge and click the cylinder into place behind the barrel.

"Sorry, kid," I shake my head as I step into the doorway outside, my gun aimed as I start to cock it, "But y—"

My eyes widen in surprise at the sudden loud noise.

Her gun had fired.

She's looking at me, but she cocks her gun again and turns her aim back to Valentinov.

A sharp, heavy pain blooms across my chest and I look down at myself.

The front of my shirt is rapidly soaking with my blood.

_She shot me! The bitch shot me!_

I'm about to heave a breath in to curse the shit out of her, but I cannot draw breath. I cough instead and drop my gun. My hands seem to have gone all weak on me. Suddenly, my legs won't hold me up, and I fall to the ground, halfway in and halfway out of the door.

How appropriate, I think as my limbs are numbing, that I should die on the threshold between inside and out.

I hear voices again. They are speaking in Russian now, Valentinov and Maria are, but I understand them nonetheless. Kazuar. Not Maria. Kazuar.

I turn my head with all my remaining strength to see blurred versions of Maria and Valentinov standing in the alley in the snow.

"Please tell me, Major," Maria's voice is a calm, terrifying, deadly whisper, and her gun is still fixed firmly on Valentinov. "In that battle at Moscow, the enemy had set up an ambush. Did you know about that, Major?"

Valentinov chuckles and cracks his neck from one side to the other. "Ah, Maria… the world of adults is so dirty…" He reaches into his coat to draw his gun, but Maria is faster.

**_BANG!_**

Then Valentinov is on the ground beside me. The hammer on Mar—the Kazuar's gun cocks back again. My vision has gone black, but I can tell by the sound of his voice. I can also tell by the groans of pain and intermittent cursing that Valentinov's, unlike mine, had not been a fatal shot. She has another shot left, and she's loaded and ready.

Then I hear the hammer softly click back into place, the trigger never pulled. She isn't going to shoot him again.

I hear the slow creak of snow under a light boot as she rocks back on one heel, then pivots, and walks away, leaving us to bleed out in the alley – both of us with guns drawn, looking for all the world, or all the police would care, like we'd shot each other.

I don't want to die!

_(Patrick…)_

The same voice I heard upstairs last night, when we were stashing the Kazuar's stuff… I'd thought it was a ghost.

_(I won't let you die, Patrick…)_

Whose voice is it?

_(I am… that is, I was… a powerful man, once. Very talented in the selfsame arts where your talents lie, Patrick O'Rourke.)_

I'm cold. Everything feels unreal. Part of me wants to be wary, to be scared. But that part of me is too small and can't win over the rest of me, which is too numb and too tired to muster a reaction. Am I dead?

_(Yes. And no.)_

I don't understand.

_(My name is Rupert Hamilton.)_

Hamilton… was my mother's maiden name.

_(Indeed, Patrick. And she was, like you are, heir to my legacy.)_

But now we are both dead…

_(No, Patrick… I told you… I won't let you die. I won't **ever** let you die. We will work together, Patrick, you and I. You will perfect an art I did not live long enough to hone. You will become what I did not. Together we will.)_

Suddenly, all things are clear to me. Not just that which concerned me, but All Things. My eyes are opened with the white-hot brilliance of a thousand suns. It is hideous in its beauty, and agonizing in its ecstasy. And we are— I am—

_(We are one.)_

I am Patrick…

_(Hamilton… Yes…_

_I am._

_And I have work to do._

_**

* * *

Language Glossary:**_

_Predatel!_ – Russian for "Traitor!"


	16. 16: A Long, Long Way From Home

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – A Long, Long Way From Home**

March 12, 1921

General Ikki Yoneda sat at his desk with four open file folders in front of him. The first folder was labeled "Kanzaki Sumire." A photo was paperclipped to the inside of the folder, obviously a posed shot or a bromide of a very glamorous and beautiful young woman. The typed pages contained standard statistical information: birthdate, birth place, physical description, physical health, known relatives, et cetera. Miss Kanzaki's information was voluminous.

Another shorter document, hand-written, contained the less 'natural' information about the girl. Sumire had been the groundbreaker in their research. The daughter of the developing company's president and owner, she'd been the first human being to survive an experiment with the prototype Koubu.

Kirishima Kanna's file looked more like an athlete's list of wins, medals and trophies. The photograph in her file pictured her standing beside her shorter father, the two of them holding a trophy between them, Kanna smiling hugely and giving a thumbs-up to one of what was likely to have been a great many photographers at a karate tournament in Okinawa.

The third file had no photograph at all. It was labeled "Iris Chateaubriand." The page of her physical and familial statistics was rather sparce, but the document recording her supernatural abilities bordered on being the size of a dissertation.

"I see…" Yoneda spoke into the boxy, cobbled-together field radio of a telephone, and then sighed in dismay, taking a bottle of sake out of his desk drawer. "Well, then, we don't have much time, do we?"

He set a glass down on the fourth file, labeled "Maria Tachibana." Maria's personal information page was nearly empty, most of the questions were filled in with the word "unknown."

The photograph clipped to her file was very old. The edges of the photographic paper were scalloped and bordered in white, and the entire picture was cracking and yellowing. It portrayed a tall and severe-looking Russian man whose dark eyes were brightened by a smile. On his arm was a beautiful and young Japanese woman dressed in an elabourate kimono, her hair in elegant waves piled ornately on top of her head. Her free hand rested on the shoulder of a very small child standing in front of them both.

The child's feet were clad in small black patent-leather shoes with buckles, her toes turned slightly inward. Her dress was white with eyelet lace at the sleeve cuffs and hem, which stopped at her knees. She wore wool stockings with tiny satin bows stitched to the ankles. Her fair hair was cut to just above her shoulders and held back with a black velvet band.

The photographer had painted in colour, adding a blush to the cheeks of the very sombre and wide-eyed girl. He had also touched blue into the man's formal coat, which was highly decorated with a sash of rank and with medals.

Hand-written in ink, in English, in the bottom border of the photo were the identities of the photograph's subjects: "Diplomat Bryusov Dimitrovich, with his mistress and daughter, Suma and Maria Tachibana – 1907."

There was no page for Maria's supernatural talents. Instead, there was a letter typed on official Kanzaki Heavy Industries stationery.

_Dear General Yoneda,_

_It may interest you to know that we have competitors in our research who are based in New York. They are working with Douglas-Stewart, and I have been informed that they are likewise seeking 'talent.'_

_Their most recent pursuit is a young woman named Tachibana. She is the daughter of the late Bryusov Dimitrovich, but she is no longer living in Russia. I have been told she is working as a bouncer for one of the most powerful mob families in New York City. If no one seeks her out, we may lose her to Douglas-Stewart. _

_Rent is paid in her name to an Italian immigrant named Mrs. Benedetta Luna. I wish I had more information for you, but inquiring about her seems to be quite dangerous. I hope you find this information useful._

_Yours Very Truly,_

_Kami Midoro_

_Secretary to the President_

"Yes, I understand." Yoneda filled his cup and put the bottle back in his desk. "Please send Ayame in right away."

He set the phone down and sighed. Picking up the photograph, he studied the little three-year-old girl. Life, people, circumstances all could be so cruel. Perhaps they'd spent too much time piecing together information about the girl and not enough time searching for her. Now he only hoped it was not too late.

He had high hopes for this one, particularly with her military history. So far, she was the closest thing he'd found to an actual soldier. Since females were the only ones powerful enough even to move the weaponry, the entire trained army in most countries, consisting almost completely of males, was useless. Though most urgent in his mind at the moment was to get her away from such a dangerous crowd.

A slender, strong woman entered and saluted the General. She wore a green army dress coat and skirt and black heels. Her auburn hair was swept back into a loose bun at the back of her head, and her eyes had the steely set of a survivor. "You wanted to see me, sir?"

"Pack your bags, Ayame. This time, you're going all the way to New York. And fast."

* * *


	17. 17: Do You Believe in Fate?

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

_Author's Note: I'm creating another inconsistency. I'm taking a lot of scenes from the TV series, including the previous chapter's scene of Maria shooting Valentinov in the alley with a dead guy half in and half out of an open door. Since I cannot resolve Maria being able to hang around from late March to early June without serious bodily harm after having pissed off most of the New York Mafia, I'm going to speed things up a bit. Hence, if you recognize a piece from TV where the bottom of the screen said "June 1921" and I say it's still March, that's why. _

Rating: PG-13/R – VERY strong language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Do You Believe In Fate?**

Joseph Ignazio opened his apartment door.

"Jesus Christ!"

Valentinov was slumped back against the banister, gripping his right arm and profusely bleeding on Joseph's beautiful oriental hall rug. Joseph grabbed Valentinov's left shoulder and hauled him inside his apartment, slamming the door behind them.

"What the holy hell happened?"

"Maria…" Valentinov panted, "…found us… don't… know how…"

"And Patrick?"

"Dead."

"Holy shit… holy shit… this is bad…"

Valentinov collapsed onto Joseph's leather couch, and Joseph was too distressed to worry about blood on his furniture.

"Where's his body?"

Valentinov panted. "Joseph… my arm…! Had to leave him… can _nyet_ move my arm…"

"We gotta get him," Joseph ignored Valentinov. "Come on."

"_Bozhe moy,_ Joseph!" Valentinov yelped, disbelieving Joseph's priorities as the Italian man dragged him to his feet. "My arm!"

Joseph stared at him for a moment, as if only now just appreciating fully the poor state of Valentinov's health. "She shot you?"

Valentinov gaped. "YES!"

"Okay. Look. All right. We don't have time to get you taken care of first. It's seven o'clock. We gotta deal with a corpse. Then we gotta warn Lupo if we can catch him in time. Shit… holy shit… do you think she knows about the setup?"

"_Da_, that is why sh-- oh. _Nyet._ She knows about setup in Moscow. Not about restaurant."

Joseph exhaled a bit in relief. "Are you sure?"

"_Da._"

"All right. Here." Joseph went to his linen closet and pulled out a sheet. He flipped open a switchblade to start a tear in the fabric, then ripped off a long swath. "Get your coat off. Leave it here. There's too much blood. Jesus Christ, Valentinov, is any of this blood Patrick's?"

Valentinov shook his head, dazedly, as he shrugged out of his coat. Joseph hissed at the location of the bullet hole. That was either major artery, or bone, or both. Valentinov didn't have much chance of saving his gun arm. The Kazuar had effectively _permanently_ disarmed him.

Quickly, Joseph wrapped the Russian's arm, cutting three more swaths of fabric before even staunching the bleeding. Then he twisted the last length of fabric and wrapped it around Valentinov's upper arm, above the wound.

Valentinov's eyes widened in fear. "What are you doing?"

"Keeping you from bleeding to death." Joseph grabbed his pipe from the coffee table and gave it a solid whack on the counter, breaking off the bowl end. He tied the shaft of the pipe into the knot of the bandaging and started to turn it.

As the tourniquet tightened, Valentinov squeezed his eyes closed and gritted his teeth, his steadying hand on Joseph's shoulder becoming powerful enough to cause pain.

Joseph tied it off on the tight side, and Valentinov was anxiously awaiting the part where numbness would stop the pain. Joseph went to get Valentinov another coat, and Valentinov took several long pulls from the flask he kept in his jacket, careful not to drink too much. With the amount of blood he'd lost, it would not take much alcohol to disorient him.

"All right," Joseph opened the door for Valentinov. "Show me."

* * *

Vincenzo Luna stopped in the alley and covered his mouth with his hand. 

This had to be Maria's work, though he found himself not wanting to think that.

It was dark, but the back door of the Douglas-Stewart Building stood open, the dying embers of the incinerator throwing enough light to reveal a lot of blood in the alley. The snow had started to cover the tracks, but not enough. There were two distinct pools of blood, and two distinct pairs of footprints getting up and walking away.

For a moment, he feared that Maria had been wounded, but her boot tracks, a third set, the ones with the narrowed toe and slight heel, never stumbled, never fell, had no blood near them, and walked calmly out of the alley.

At least she hadn't killed anyone.

Vincenzo glanced warily down the alley and then decided to clean up for her, before anyone with more brass than Vincenzo could get here and try to make heads or tails of what had happened.

Inside the incinerator room was a utility sink and several fire buckets. Vincenzo filled one and went to the incinerator. From what had not burned, he recognized an empty picture frame, some women's clothing, a hairbrush missing its boar's hair bristles from the fire… These were Maria's things, he'd seen her wear that blue shirt…

Nothing was salvagable. They'd burned everything she owned. He threw a bucket of water into the incinerator and doused it.

Within five minutes, Vincenzo had the entire alley rinsed of blood, footprints and snow, and slowly re-freezing in the late March cold.

Then he continued on his earlier errand – catching his mother alone and without customers for five minutes.

* * *

"Right here," Joseph told the taxi driver and opened the door even before the steam-powered automobile had rolled fully to a stop. 

He and Valentinov stepped out in front of the Douglas-Stewart Building. Joseph paid the driver for his time and silence, then looked to Valentinov as the taxi trundled away.

"In back," Valentinov hissed through pain-clenched teeth, cradling his wounded arm. He lead Joseph around the building to an alley that turned a corner along the back. Two steps into the back alley, Valentinov paused and said, "Careful—"

…just as Joseph slipped, flailed, and regained his balance on wet, slushy ice.

Valentinov's jaw fell open. "Gone…"

"Gone?" Joseph tread more carefully into the alley, toward the back door of the incinerator room. "Whaddaya mean 'gone?'"

"I mean," Valentinov vollowed Joseph across the ice with considerable ease, "Is everything gone." Valentinov stopped to turn the knob on the door. It was locked. "He was here. Right here."

"So where did he go? You said he was dead."

"Was. Am certain of it." Valentinov looked at the ice that coated the alley. "Someone cleaned whole area. Someone take body, and…" he gestured away with both hands, "wash out street."

"Alley," Joseph corrected. "Someone cleaned up the crime scene? Who, the girl?"

Valentinov shrugged. "Do _nyet_ think so. She walk out, leave us both there. Too angry to think of consequence. But here…" he pointed at the ground, "was lot of blood. Snow…"

He blinked and knelt down, picking up a small metal object. "Bullets."

Valentinov dropped the item into Joseph's open palm. This was not a bullet shell. Only two rounds were fired, and the Kazuar did not empty her cartridge here. This was a fired bullet. And it had struck something – or, by the traces on it, someone. Joseph looked at Valentinov's arm. There was no chance of the bullet having come out of his arm. This must have been the one that hit Patrick. Wherever he was.

Joseph regarded the bullet in his palm blankly. Slowly he was losing the ability to contain his rage. His fingers tremblingly closed into a fist around the bullet. With a growl of fury, his fist connected with the solid oak door to the incinerator room.

"DAMN HER!"

* * *

"Well, well, this is very interesting news," Brent Furlong sat at his desk in his penthouse home uptown. "Thank you for coming out so late, Mr. Hayes." 

Brent's secretary waved it off. "No trouble at all, Mr. Furlong. I'm just glad we found out so soon. I think I know the restaurant, sir."

"Oh, do you? Hm… then we've still a chance. Those buffoons I call my investors would do away with her, wouldn't they?"

"That's what my contact says the plan is, same as the other Russian guy."

"_Tch._ How wasteful. We can count our blessings that the economy is not run by the New York Mafia."

"Yes, sir."

"What time is doomsday for our little protégé, Mr. Hayes?"

"She's scheduled to meet Vinnie Lupo for dinner at 9:00. Her orders are to negotiate a temporary cease-fire, even if it's a hostile one, with his gang. She doesn't know about the contracts with Douglas-Stewart."

"Good. And Mr. Lupo intends to shoot her under the table? How barbaric…"

"Oh, no. If he did that, there'd be witnesses. It'd be hard to look innocent. Lupo's reserved a table on the balcony overlooking the harbour. He's got a sniper in the old tenement hall next door. Nine-thirty is his time."

"Ah. Shows some forethought at least. Well, Mr. Hayes," Brent took out his pocketwatch and flipped it open. "She has two hours to live. Unless you get yourself to that restaurant so that we can save _two_ very talented souls today."

"You got it, boss. Here's the hotel, by the way," he dropped a business card on Furlong's desk, and headed for the door.

"Oh, and Mr. Hayes?"

He turned back, his hand still on the doorknob.

"How is our good friend Patrick enjoying my gift of… _assistance_… to him?"

"He was real surprised, Mr. Furlong. But he's improving in his studies now."

"Excellent."

* * *

"I'm very sorry to inform you of this, Mr. Valentinov," the doctor closed the door gently behind him. The room they were in was dim and sterile, like every hospital Valentinov had ever been in. Valentinov was sitting o the bed, still cradling his immoble right arm. The nurses had bandaged it better, but there was only so much they could do.

The doctor shook his head, "The bullet shattered the bone and tore a major artery. Mr. Valentinov, there is simply nothing we can do. We cannot save the arm. Even if it had never been wrapped with a tourniquet, we could not have salvaged it."

Something about the cold, steel, emotionless look in the Russian officer's eyes was very unsettling. The silence became too uncomfortable for the doctor. "I-Isn't there anything you can tell me about your shooter, Mr. Valentinov, before we bring you into surgery? Anything we can tell to the police? At least we can bring the criminal to justice…"

"_Nyet._"

"Yes. Well. Again, I am sorry. A nurse will be with you shortly, to bring you a medical robe and bring you into surgery. …are you sure you don't want to speak to the police?"

"I will take care of it," Valentinov's voice was measured, fiercely restrained. The doctor nodded and softly closed the doors behind him as he left.

* * *


	18. 18: To Kill a Firebird

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13/R – VERY strong language

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – To Kill a Firebird**

"A' course I know Benedetta Luna," the bartender said, pausing in his eternal task of wiping down the bar. "She's gotta restaurant down in Nolita."

"In… what?" Fujieda Ayame looked back at the paper she'd shown to the bartender containing the English-written name of the Italian woman.

"Nolita. Yanno. North. Little Italy. No-L-Ita. Joint's called Luna's Restaurant. Got apartments upstairs, too."

"You can tell me… how I can go there?"

"Yeah, sure, lady. But it's awmost 7:30. Crowd down there getsa li'l rough dis time a night, if ya know what I mean. Gotta be _family_ or ya ain't welcome. If ya want, I can recommend a better place for di—"

"No. Thank you. I must go see Ms. Luna-san. It is urgent." Ayame spoke clearly and slowly, her tone careful, but brooking no further argument.

* * *

Maria's gun was cleaned and reloaded. Her hands had stopped shaking. Almost three dollars of the ten that Joseph had given her went to paying for the hotel room in which she was currently sitting, and buying as strong a drink as she could watch the bartender make downstairs. 

The room was stunning, but Maria didn't have the presence of mind to appreciate it. It cost almost half a month's rent when compared to the dump in which she'd lived until a couple of months ago. Despite her 'windfall' from Carlo Bianni's death, Maria never became very affluent. She could have, but she preferred subtlety. Her apartment was nice, but not opulent. Maria had learned to live with hardship, poverty, hunger and want, but she was raised in privilege, the daughter of a powerful and wealthy Russian man. Her taste was still exquisite. When she did buy something for herself, it was the best she could afford – but never more than she could afford.

So the luxurious hotel room passed unnoticed. She sat at the window in the upholstered armchair, her chin rested in her hand and her gaze unfocused into the darkness outside. So far above the city street, she could almost imagine it was smaller, more distant… less grasping and treacherous, less prepared to end her this very night.

She looked at the clock on the desk. Seven-thirty. She could see the restaurant from her room, but time and experience had taught her never to be the last one to sit down at dinner.

She stood from her chair by the window and went to get her coat. Time felt ever so slightly out of joint – as if everything were somewhat unreal.

She had tried not to become this. She had tried everything she could think of. Fate was a curious device. Every path she chose lead her here – no matter how many times she'd changed her mind, changed her path, changed her life, she was still going to dinner with a loaded gun in her coat. She was still being sent alone to arrange a tenuous peace between two powerful mob families, and she was still instructed to let Lupo walk her to a taxi… And if he disagreed to the negotiations, she was to be certain he did not make the trip from restaurant to taxi alive. _How_ she managed that was up to her.

Dinner would determine her method, though she was hoping it would not be necessary. If he was a cad, he could easily be lured to her hotel room, and once alone with him, she could easily kill him. If he was suspicious, she was to have the restaurant call a taxi for her, giving a number that would have rung O'Rourke and Cavaradossi. They would come in a steamer and pick her up, and they would be her getaway drivers, leaving Lupo on the street. The problem with that plan now was that she'd killed O'Rourke earlier this evening. Maria had shown Valentinov mercy, though. No doubt, by now, Joseph Ignazio knew what she'd done. Perhaps even his uncle knew.

Her choices were few, and the list of her enemies was great. What she had no doubt about now was that someone, if not many someones, wanted her dead, tonight.

Maria tied her coat and pulled on her read leather gloves.

She had escaped death twice in her life; once when her family died and she did not, and again when her regiment died and she did not.

_Third time is a charm_, she thought wryly as she closed the hotel room door.

* * *

"_Si, io sono Benedetta Luna_," Mama Luna responded upon hearing her name. 

Ayame smiled. "Ms. Luna-san, I am looking for…" she drew the old, cracked photo from her briefcase and held it out to the woman. "Maria Tachibana. Though… she is three years old in this picture, and she would be almost eighteen, now."

Mama Luna looked at the picture through her narrow spectacles, confused.

Ayame elabourated. "She pay rent to you. She is Russian."

"Ah! _Si_! Kazuar!"

"…Kazuar?"

"_Si_, Kazuar-- Ah, Vincenzo!" Mama Luna reached to her son, who'd just rushed in through the door. "Vincenzo, _aiutate, per favore. Questa donna sta cercando la ragazza Russa."_

Vincenzo turned suspicious eyes on Ayame, which Ayame took as a bad sign. If these were her quasi-allies and they were suspicious of someone looking for her, she's in a _lot_ of trouble. "Why are you looking for Maria?" he asked, not missing the army uniform the Japanese woman was wearing.

"Please, Mister…" Ayame recalled the name Mama Luna had just called him, "Vincenzo-san, Maria may be in very much danger."

"Mama, _per favore_, I need to speak to you alone," Vincenzo tried to drag his mother toward the kitchen door, disregarding Ayame's request.

"Wait, please!" Ayame called. "If you do not help me find her, it may be too late."

Vincenzo paused. Something about the expression on her face, the desperation in her voice, something about her eyes made Vincenzo believe he could trust her.

He sighed. "_Si_, she is in much danger. She is going to the restaurant below Battery Park, the one on the Harbour with the balcony th—"

"Driftwood!" Mama Luna gasped and covered her mouth with her hand.

Vincenzo and Ayame looked at her, startled.

Mama Luna began babbling in Italian so quickly that Ayame couldn't follow even a little. Vincenzo translated for her.

"Mama says… Rudolfo… friend of hers… runs Italian restaurant uptown called Vermicelli's… and both families… Ignazio and Lupo… met there today… with the owner of Douglas-Stewart…"

Ayame's eyes widened.

"…later, Ignazio's nephew came back with Lupo, alone… the Kazuar—Maria… had shot some people…" Vincenzo cringed to hear this part, for he had sent her right to them and had cleaned up the scene. "…one man they believe is dead, but no body. Lupo is going to the Driftwood to meet someone for dinner… to kill them!"

Ayame grabbed Vincenzo's sleeve.

"When?"

Vincenzo looked at Mama Luna. "_Quando?"_

"_Alla nove."_

"Nine o'clock."

"Show me!" Ayame half plead, half ordered Vincenzo, dragging him out the door.

Mama Luna looked up at the grandfather clock which stood by the kitchen door. It was two minutes after eight o'clock. She crossed herself.

_**

* * *

Language Glossary:**_

_Si, io sono Benedetta Luna_ – Yes, I am Benedetta Luna.

_Aiutate, per favore. _– You help, please.

_Questa donna sta cercando la ragazza russa._ – This lady is looking for the Russian girl.


	19. 19: Goodbye, My Memories

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13, language, violence

* * *

"**FROM THE ASHES" – Goodbye, My Memories**

The clock in the lobby of the hotel was striking eight as Maria entered it from the grand stairs, heading toward the door.

"Good evening, Miss Dimitrovich," a voice behind her startled her and she spun around. "Oh, no, I apologize, that isn't correct… Miss Tachibana would be the tradition, yes?"

Behind Maria stood a refined gentleman, dressed impeccably. His eyes were amber and his hair was red and curly. His hands were in his pockets, and he drew one out and extended it to her. She looked at his hand and then back up at him. His eyes… there was something unsettling about his eyes.

"Do I know you?" she asked, not taking his hand.

"Not yet," the man smiled.

Maria tightened her hand in her wool coat collar, holding it closed against her chest. "Then excuse me, please. Am very busy."

"I am quite certain you are, Miss Tachibana," the man followed her, intercepting her near the door. "But perhaps you should hear me out. At least…" he extended his hand again. "At least return the courtesy."

Maria deliberated, then took his hand, diplomatically.

"Gloves…" the man pursed his lips, observing Maria's red-gloved hands. "You seek to make this difficult on me, Miss Tachibana."

Maria did not understand what he meant. He did not release her hand.

"My name is Brent Furlong. And I have an offer for you which could change your life. Or save it."

Maria tried to draw her hand away, but Furlong tightened his grip, his left fist was now around her wrist as well, and he hauled her closer to him, confidentially. Maria glanced over her shoulder. The lobby was empty except for the concierge, whose head was down behind the desk.

"Release me," Maria commanded in a low whisper.

"Release you? You did not sound so certain. Should you not yell for the police? Now why on earth would a young girl being harrassed by a man not yell for the police? Go ahead, Miss Tachibana, do the respectable thing. Scream."

Maria's eyes narrowed, and she glanced over her shoulder again, trying to pry his fingers off her wrist with her free hand. She gritted her teeth.

"Oh dear… perhaps you have something to hide from the police as well. Perhaps that is why you cannot call them for aid. You are short on allies, Miss Tachibana, aren't you? What fate awaits you where you are going? And what fate awaits if you cry for help? At least hear me out, and I will give you your only choice left."

Maria gave a good solid yank, and Furlong stumbled forward, then imprisoned both her wrists, holding both her hands close to his heart with a much greater strength. He would not underestimate her strength again. His voice lowered even further in volume. "I have been made aware of your… talents."

Maria had many talents: marksmanship, billiards, linguistics, music, subterfuge… She did not know to which he was referring. She glared and responded through gritted teeth. "What talents?"

Furlong smiled and closed his eyes, still holding tightly to Maria's hands and wrists. Maria felt like she was being pulled from the inside out. The world swam and she nearly staggered. Then she noticed that her hands were cold. Very cold. Cold in a familiar way. Her eyes widened.

Furlong was _pulling_ her spiritual power of ice out of her!

"Stop—" she whispered, trying to twist free, and glancing again over her shoulder. They had attracted no attention.

Furlong stopped. He opened his eyes to regard the panicking girl in his grip. "So Patrick was correct… you have a considerable talent. Very strong indeed. Far stronger than Patrick's, I dare say. Though quite obviously untrained."

"…Patrick?" The Patrick she'd killed? Did this man know him? "What talent…? Let go of me—"

"Hush," Furlong said, softly. "Miss Tachibana, you will cause a scene." He glanced toward the concierge desk. "Someone might call the police."

"Let them!" Maria lunged forward, doing a simple inward break-grip and shoving Furlong powerfully back against the broom closet door, then ran into the street.

Furlong stood, straightened his coat, regained his composure, and then went to the concierge desk. "Ring Mr. Hayes for me, would you?" Tell him that I will need his services after all. At the Driftwood. Nine o'clock."

"Yes, Mr. Furlong."

* * *

"Step on it!" Vincenzo leaned forward to urge the taxi driver. Ayame sat stiffly beside him, gripping the door handle. 

"It's jus' aroun' dis corner," the driver replied, unruffled. Everything in New York is urgent.

Ayame jumped out and Vincenzo paid the driver.

Jonathan Hayes stopped in front of a tall and well-lit building. A taxi skidded to a halt next to him and a woman jumped out. He touched her on the arm.

"Hey, lady. This the Driftwood?"

The lady looked up at the building, then nodded, distractedly, to Hayes. "Ah… _hai_." Then she looked back at her companion for confirmation.

"_Si_, Driftwood," the man responded quickly while paying the taxi driver. Then the two of them headed toward the restaurant stairs.

Hayes grabbed the man's arm, "Buddy, yanno what time it is?"

The young man sighed as he watched the lady in uniform he'd come with hurriedly climbing the restaurant stairs without him. He took out his pocket watch. "Eight twenty-four."

"Hey, you don't happen to have a light, do you?"

The young man saw the restaurant doors close behind his companion. "Of course." He pulled a box of matches from his pocket, knowing how long it would take to light this man's cigar in the March wind on the harbour.

* * *

Maria stopped in front of the Driftwood. It was twenty-five after eight. She gave the area a quick surveillance. A bum at the foot of the grand stairs. A valet at the top of the stairs. Two men by the street trying to get a cigar lit. Both had their backs to her, collars up against the wind. They did not look like Lupo family members. 

Deciding the outside was safe, she climbed the stairs. The valet, a boy of about fifteen, opened the door for her.

"Good evening, may I help you?" the host asked, doing his best to ignore a slight altercations going on beside him. A hostess was attempting to explain the need for a reservation to a Japanese woman in a uniform.

"_Da_, have reservation for… under name 'Lupo.'"

"Ah! Miss Tachibana, of course. Right this way, please."

* * *

"Please! It is _urgent_ that—" 

"Ah! Miss Tachibana, of course. Right this way, please."

Ayame paused and looked to her left. A host turned and lead a slender and _very_ tall blonde woman into the restaurant. That was Maria.

Ayame withered. She had not wanted to resort to this, but in half an hour, Maria Tachibana would be dead.

She subtly pulled a tell dollar bill from her jacket. "I believe it was a balcony table," she smiled.

"Ah… of course, Ms. Fujieda, please forgive the confusion…"

* * *

Umberto Lupo was not here yet. The host seated Maria alone at a table against the balcony railing, where she could watch the ferries in the harbour. The city lights were bright against the full darkness of night. 

Softly she thanked the host and declined to allow him to remove her coat. It had stopped snowing, but it had not warmed up enough to dress like she was indoors. Then the host left her alone.

She leaned on the table, her chin in her hand, gazing out across the harbour. Her stomach was unsettled. She was subconsciously tamping down panic and the strain was making her nauseous, she realized.

The waiter startled her as he brought a menu and a basket of breadsticks. Just looking at the bread turned her stomach. She asked for hot tea with a slice of lemon and exhaled in relief to be left alone again.

Now, of all times, she needed the ice she could never seem to control. She closed her eyes and tried to let the cold air around her seep into her without the physical protestation of shivering. She drank in long, slow breaths to ease her nerves and calm her.

She set everything from her mind. She did not worry about which hotel she would try to reserve for tomorrow night or how she would pay for it, or whether or not she could stay in the current one tonight. She did not wonder what Valentinov would do to her in recompense for her bullet, or even if he could find her. She did not think of her flat or its proprietor or the proprietor's son. She did not worry about the strange Mr. Furlong. She even managed, for a brief moment, to set aside the continual burden of grief she bore for her mother, her father, and for Yuri; a burden so perpetual that she often forgot its considerable weight, and the relief of it felt similar to elation.

She was concentrated so fully on this that she did not notice someone rise from a nearby table until she heard the chair across from her being pulled out.

Maria's mind flipped into battle readiness in an instant. She opened her eyes and slid her right hand into her coat, closing her red-gloved fingers around the butt of her Enfield, holstered under her left arm.

A dark haired woman in a military uniform took the seat across from Maria.

"Who are you?" Maria was at her most threatening, her voice an icy whisper.

"Please forgive my intrusion, Miss Tachibana-san, but there is little time. My name is Fujieda Ayame." Ayame's own panic was carefully restrained as well. Her words were slow and careful – her English was not excellent, either, but it was the only language they had fully in common.

"You know me. How?" Maria glanced at the clock that stood in the balcony door. Eight thirty-nine. Lupo would be here any moment. And she kept bumping into people who knew her name. More was going on here than Maria knew about.

"I think many people know you, though you may not realize that."

Maria's brows furrowed. "Tell me one reason… should _nyet_ call host… and have you taken by police."

"I will tell you three," Ayame smiled pleasantly. "One, you are a criminal and cannot report anything to the police… without danger for yourself. Two, if you stay here, in…" she glanced at the clock, "…twenty minutes, you will be dead. And three, I have come here… all the way from Japan… for the sole purpose of saving your life."

And then stun of those revelations effectively silenced the Kazuar.

Ayame continued. "You know, of course, about the Demon Wars not so many years ago."

Maria nodded, glancing more frequently at the clock, now that her life seemed to have a countdown.

"Tokyo was nearly devastated by the war. And we have reason to believe… that it will happen again. Perhaps soon. The government and Kanzaki Heavy Industries… have developed weaponry capable of… combatting such an enemy, but… only certain people… people with particularly strong spiritual powers… are able to run the weaponry."

Maria gritted her teeth. "If you have come… from Douglas-Stewart… tell Mr. Furlong… am _still_ not interested."

Now it was Ayame's turn to be stunned. "I am not with Douglas-Stewart. But… I am sorry I did not come to you before they did. Their company's intent seems less… honourable. They are very closely tied… with the Mafia here, as I am sure you know."

No, in fact, she did not know. But it explained how Mr. Furlong found her. "So, Mr. Ignazio working for them too?"

"And Umberto Lupo's family as well," Ayame nodded.

Maria felt mauseous all over again. Suddenly the sheer amount of danger she was in, and how, became clear to her. "How did you find me here?" she asked, glancing at the clock again.

Ayame looked, too. 8:45.

Before Ayame could answer, Maria added another question. "And… should we…" she made as if to stand, "find less… _deadly _location?"

"When it is safe, Mr. Luna will come for us."

At that, Maria smiled. One trustworthy person in her life – that was a good start. "But why your company is so more honourable than Douglas-Stewart?"

"We are not a company, Miss Tachibana. We are an army."

* * *

"Ah ha, if you'll excuse me," Mr. Hayes tipped his cigar at Vincenzo, "my 'guest' is here." 

Vincenzo nodded and watched the stranger who'd kept him from his last word with Ayame. The man walked down the street a bit toward—

--Umberto Lupo, who was just getting out of a taxi, and being held up by the man whose cigar Vincenzo had lit! Held up at gunpoint, hidden by a semi-inconspicuous lump in his trench coat, and then they both walked to a nearby alley.

Vincenzo knew now that if they were to get out of there in tact, it had to be now, while Lupo was otherwise occupied.

* * *

"Is that all?" Maria asked, gazing into the delicate, shell-shaped porcelain tea cup on the table in front of her. 

Ayame looked up. "Hm?"

The low, mournful sound of a ship's steam whistle carried across the harbour. Ayame watched the sombre young woman across from her. She'd just finished detailing the purpose and function of the Imperial Assault Unit, the goals and reasons for its existence, its needs and how it was that it lead Ayame here, to Maria.

"You must have… other reason… for defending the city?" Maria's peircing green eyes lifted to meet Ayame's, as if they could find and examine her soul.

"Well… the city has… lots of memories for me."

Perhaps something kindred lit a connection between the two. "Lots of memories?"

"Yes…" Ayame smiled wistfully.

Abruptly, Maria stood and put both hands on the railing. In just the few minutes Ayame had spent with the Russian so far, she knew they had not made a mistake in choosing her.

"Then… I accept."

Ayame blinked in surprise. She glanced at the clock. Three minutes until nine. And still, Vincenzo had not yet come up for them.

"I, too, have… memories," Maria whispered as if relenquishing them to the moon. What she said next, Ayame did not know. It was not in English.

"_Vershrei, moy uchets dva_…"

"Miss Fujieda," the waiter interrupted, and both Ayame and Maria turned around. "There is a gentleman named Mr. Luna asking for you at the front. I would not disturb you, but he… oh!"

The waiter was interrupted by Ayame dragging Maria past him by the wrist at a run.

* * *

Vincenzo met them in the restaurant lobby. He pulled them aside and whispered urgently to them both. "Two shots been fired, I don't know at who. Lupo was here. He got jumped by one of Douglas-Stewart's men—" 

"They are here?" Ayame raised her eyebrows.

Maria was looking suspiciously between Ayame and Vincenzo, almost as if she was beginning to wonder if they were working for someone too, or if there was anyone in New York who was not twisted up in some strange scandal meant to exploit her or kill her.

Ayame jumped as the clock began striking nine. "We have no time! Is it safe to go out?"

"_Si,_" Vincenzo answered, and Ayame ran, pulling Maria along with her again. Maria halted at the foot of the steps, spotting Lupo and one of his gang up the street a bit. They had not seen Maria yet, but she could hear them.

* * *

"What happened?" Lupo rubbed his head. 

"Some stiff cold-cocked ya. I got 'im, though," his lackey answered.

Vincenzo whispered, "Go! I will hold them off!"

Maria doubted Vincenzo's ability to do that, but Ayame gave her no choice, dragging her away by the arm again.

* * *

"Shit, what time is it?" Lupo asked his lackey. 

"Nine."

"Where's the girl?"

"The girl?"

"The girl! The Kazuar!"

"Ya mean her?" Lupo's lackey pointed at Maria and Ayame, running away down along the harbour.

"Stop her!" Lupo commanded his lackey and pulled out his gun. "Outta the way!" Lupo yelled at Vincenzo, who'd just crossed his path. "This is official busine—ah!"

Vincenzo silenced Lupo by breaking his nose. Lupo hadn't expected that. Then Vincenzo turned and ran after the lackey who was chasing down Maria and Ayame, afforded a few seconds by Lupo's state of shock. Vincenzo caught the guy by the coat and managed with great difficulty to restrain him. And that's when Lupo caught up. He pistol-whipped Vincenzo, who crumpled to the street, unconscious.

Lupo hissed and shook his head, holding a bloody white handkerchief to his nose. "Ow…" he gingerly pressed on his broken nose, then looked down at the unconscious young man. "It's a good thing you're Mama Luna's kid, you little bastard."

And they left him there on the street, continuing after the two women.

* * *

"This way!" Now it was Maria who was dragging Ayame, the Mafia bouncer being far more familiar with New York than the Japanese woman. 

"We need to get to the docks," Ayame panted and Maria nodded in acknowledgement. The Russian was leading them through a maze of back alleys.

_**KAPOW!**_

A bullet buried itself into the mortar and bric of the wall beside Maria's head. She ducked instinctively and glanced back over her shoulder as they rounded a corner. To Maria's surprise, Ayame was doing excellently. She picked up the pace even more and the Japanese military officer had not even flinched when they were fired upon.

Maria was not dragging Ayame any longer, nor the other way around. It was faster for each of them to run free. They had to put enough distance between them and Lupo that he could not hear which way they turned. Maria fell behind a bit and drew out her gun. She overturned two metal garbage cans in their wake, hoping to slow down their pursuers.

Ayame heard the police sirens in the distance and cursed inwardly. Getting mixed up in a crime family whose list of offenses only _started_ with murder was not in Ayame's orders. At least now she could only hear one set of running footsteps behind them.

Another burst of mortar and stone on the wall just ahead of them stopped them in their tracks.

Lupo was at the other end of the cement dry dock they'd just come through. His gun was aimed at Maria. And hers was aimed at him. Just in case, she grabbed Ayame's wrist and hauled the Japanese woman behind her.

Maria's focus returned.

And it began to snow.

"I don't want the other broad," Lupo said calmly through the handkercheif he still held to his nose. "Just you."

Maria was silent. She cocked back the hammer.

Ayame shivered. Maria's gloved fingers were uncomfortably cold around her wrist where the Kazuar was holding on to her.

Maria stared down Lupo's gun barrel. That was her target. She was not a killer anymore. She was no one's hired gun. She was a defender of humanity, and she could stop him. She could stop this man without killing him. But she had to shoot first. So, like someone would interrupt a conversation, she suddenly fired, before Lupo had even finished taking a breath to speak.

Instinctively, Lupo fired as well, reflexively, as soon as he heard Maria's gun go off. But it was too late. Maria's bullet went straight to its mark – the barrel of Lupo's gun. And there it met Lupo's bullet.

And exploded.

Lupo yelped in surprise and pain, dropping his gun with a clatter and falling to the dry dock floor, moaning in pain.

"_Za vashe zdarovye,_" Maria whispered, without the slightest trace of a smile, then turned back to Ayame to continue. Lupo's lackey was still unaccounted for, and they both knew it as they ran into the marina.

Maria did her best not to seem suspicious, or even armed, as she scanned the streets. Ayame stood at the desk, trying to book passage on the ship moored at the docks at the moment. Any European destination would do.

Maria was whispering something to herself occasionally, seemingly some mantra.

"What is it you are saying?" Ayame asked.

"Five," Maria repeated, slightly louder, her eyes still on the streets from which they'd recently fled. Her gun was holstered again, but her hand lingered near it.

"Five?"

The Russian markswoman nodded once. "Is easy to forget… how many are left."

Ayame smirked at what she had believed was a joke, but the Russian was not smiling. Then she thought about how difficult it would be to keep count over a long period of time, and how terrifying it must be to be in a moment of life or death, where a fraction of a second could buy you, or cost you, your life – and hear the ineffectual _klik_ of the hammer striking the back of an empty shell. She guessed Maria had learned that lesson the hard way.

Ayame managed tickets on a ship which was scheduled to weigh anchor in a half an hour. Ayame perceived this to be tremendous and unbelievable luck, but to Maria, it did not seem soon enough. How long would it be before Lupo was able to figure out that a foreign woman dragging Maria downtown was going to the first ship off Manhattan?

They boarded the ship immediately. Maria stopped at the top of the ramp, waiting for her hair to be roughly combed through for lice and her eyes and throat to be peered into for disease. The white uniformed man at the top of the ramp did not mishandle her. She looked to Ayame, who stepped past her to the man.

Instead of being examined, Ayame instructed the man as to which ship she'd arrived on – only just this morning – and requested someone to retrieve her luggage from that ship and transfer it to this one. The uniformed man turned and blew his whistle, several crewman responded immediately.

Another crewman came to show Maria and Ayame to their cabins. Due to the lateness of the booking of their tickets, their cabins were not side by side, for which the crewman was quite apologetic.

The cabin given to Maria was small, but it was a paradise when compared with the shared steerage cabing she had on the trip over to America. A long string of ships and trains and taxis lay before both women.

* * *

Maria closed the door behind her and leaned back against it. Directly across from her door was a mirror. She looked at herself. Instinctively, she reached up to try to smoothe her disarrayed hair. Then she realized what a silly action that was. 

So much of her was disarrayed that she could not find any hope of ordering it again. So many times had the Russian reinvented herself that she was not certain she had an incarnation left.

She stepped closer to the mirror and saw the Kazuar in its reflection. She winced. Her face was bruised and scraped. Her right eye was blackened. She could feel the locations of the rest of the bruises dealt to her at Silvio's hands.

Thirty-four hours ago, she was dressed as a boy, playing billiards, about to make her "big break" with the New York Mafia. Now she had lost everything. Again.

She shrugged out of her wool coat, still staring at her reflection. The coat slid off her arms and puddled around her feet. She did not break eye contact with her reflection as she pulled off her red leather gloves and dropped them to the floor.

_Who are you,_ her reflection seemed to ask.

She unbuttoned her suit jacket and let it fall, too. She felt… lessened. As if the gloves and coat and jacket had been an insulation, or armour.

Now she stepped out of the pile of cloth, one step closer to the mirror, wearing her pin-striped pants, saddle-boots and white blouse. She could see the thin knife cut across her throat.

_Who are you, Kazuar?_

_No_, Maria thought as she laid a palm on the mirror glass. _No, the Kazuar is dead._

But the mirror's inquisition was relentless.

The glass around her hand grew fogged and patterned with frost as she whispered on thing to her reflection, one thing she wished never to forget.

"Maria Tachibana."

She took her hand away from the glass and her reflection was visible inside the handprint.

She looked down at her scarred hand. Slowly, she felt the back of her throat tighten. No, she commanded herself in vain.

She tried to force her mind to look ahead instead of behind. She was running again, just as she'd run from Russian, leaving nothing but a swath of death, grief, loss and burned bridges in her wake.

Her father had always told her that it was always darkest just before dawn, but how much darker could it get? Dawn shoul dhave been just around the corner several times throughout her life, but instead it only seems to continue darkening.

Dazed, she turned to look at her cabin.

Nothing.

She had nothing. And she had no one. Ayame was probably unpacking by now, and Maria had nothing to her name. No family, no friends, not even the framed photo she had of Yuri. Not her rifle or her uniform, nothing. Everything was gone. Everyone was gone. And she was left in the hollowness that remained.

Joseph. Valentinov. Karpov. Her money, her future, her life in the USA, the world to which Yuri promised he would bring her. Yuri. Her parents. What did she have now but a suspicious stranger and a handful of promises about a land she owned only by half of her blood – a land to which she had never been, and a land in which she knew not a single soul?

She drew out her locket and opened it, the tiny picture inside all she had left of happiness.

The bed was behind her and she stumbled to sit on it as if she had been pushed.

She choked and then covered her mouth with her hand as if grieved by the very sound of her own sorrow. She held her breath to hold back the onslaught of sadness and fear, her jaw clenched against sobbing, but shaking. She sank to the bed, her face buried in the pillow.

* * *


	20. A Paper Moon

SAKURA TAISEN/WARS and all related characters, names and indicia are TM & © 2004 SEGA RED.

Rating: PG-13

**

* * *

**

"**FROM THE ASHES" – A Paper Moon**

"Hey, kid… kid! You all right?"

Vincenzo moaned and turned his head, opening his eyes slowly. He was looking up into a circle of strange faces from where he lay on the street. The back of his head was throbbing. He touched it gingerly and looked at his fingers. No blood. Small favour. One of the strangers reached out a hand and helped Vincenzo to his feet.

"Hit yer head?" the man asked him and Vincenzo nodded. The stranger looked around, confused. There was nothing and no one in sight. "On what?"

Vincenzo wasn't prepared to answer questions, and his brain wasn't working quickly enough to try. Instead, he stood, gripping his head, and affected a greater pain and nausea than he truly felt.

"Hey, hey—easy, now. You gonna be all right?" the stranger asked, distracted from his original question.

Vincenzo nodded and thanked the man.

"Siddown, we'll get the restaurant to getcha a steamer," the man said and gestured the woman with him – presumably his wife – to go to the doorman. Vincenzo sat down on the curb, grateful for the unexpected benevolence.

New Yorkers. They knew the nastiest and most horrible ways to kill and torment each other – and the fastest ways to be loyal and steadfast to each other as well.

Vincenzo wasn't sure what Lupo's retaliation would be for his interference. Lupo was a different family entirely, and Benedetta Luna was a favourite of the Ignazio family. At worst, his interference might strain relations, perhaps stall the negotiations for Douglas-Stewart research funding… but somehow, that seemed beneficial as well. They'd get through. Of that, he was sure. Now he just hoped Maria and the Japanese woman made it to safety. No one recognizable was anywhere in sight or earshot.

Somehow, Vincenzo had the feeling that perhaps the Kazuar would never been in his sight again, and that realization made him a bit more wistful than he'd anticipated.

* * *

At a quarter after nine o'clock, Silvio arrived at the abandoned tenement hall. Picking his steps carefully, he climbed to the seventh floor, to an old room he'd chosen yesterday.

A long-barrelled rifle slithered out from under his trenchcoat and he rested it against the wall next to the broken-out window. He exhaled and stood in the line of sight with the balcony of the restaurant, seeking his target.

After a few seconds of seeking, he began to be concerned. Lupo and the Russian girl were not on the balcony.

After another ten minutes, it became clear that they were not going to be arriving on the balcony any time soon. Fifteen more minutes and Silvio gave up, his window of time having passed. He had no idea when or how the plan had changed, but there was no one on the balcony to shoot. First order of business was to find the boss and ask him what had happened.

* * *

"It seems we both have a minor problem," Brent Furlong leaned back in the leather chair, his elbows rested on the arms and his fingers steepled before him.

Joseph Ignazio was pacing back and forth on the oriental rug in front of Furlong's desk. "Yeah, I'd say so. Your rescuer is dead, and my rescuee is gone. I gotta admit, this seems like a bit of a failure on the part of Douglas-Stewart…"

"Might I remind you," Furlong began, kindly but firmly, "that it was your own men who were attempting to kill the one we were trying to rescue…"

"'Ey, Lupo's gang are NOT my own men. I have no idea who gave them the order. I'm just glad you found out about it."

"And do you know where she's gotten off to?"

Joseph walked to the window and shook his head, pocketing his hands and gazing out across the vast expanse of midtown New York City. "No idea. Lupo and one of his guys chased them for a while. Name was Grigori. He tripped over a trash can and gave up the chase. Yeah. Trash can."

Furlong rolled his eyes heavenward. "My _kingdom_ for employees with any sense."

* * *

"It's really very new technology, Mr. Valentinov, I'm not so sure you want to be jumping right in and volunteering for this…" A rather bookish and nervous-looking bespectacled young man with his briefcase clutched to his lap. His cold and sterile chair was set near the window of the dim hospital room. In the bed lay Major Valentinov, his left arm holding up a lit cigar, and his right arm… gone.

"I have faith in you… and your company," Valentinov spoke as smoke sputtered from his lips with the breath of his words. He looked up from his careful examination of the finely rolled cigar and set his cold, steely gaze upon the man in his hospital room. "I need my right arm."

"Well, it won't be a replacement… not exactly… I don't want you to get your hopes up too high… It's a mechanical prosthesis. It's original intent was not as a replacement for a biological arm, but an enhancement. Cybernetic empowerment of a soldier's endurance and strength. It's the first step toward an even bigger dream of a full suit of body armour with mechanical enhancements. The chief is calling the sketches 'Star Kai,' but it's years until production. We can't even perfect the cybernetics yet…"

"Allow me to help you… in your research," Valentinov grinned. "In exchange… you keep me… up to date on developments."

The man seemed doubtful, still. "I'm not sure there's anything you can do to h—"

"Five thousand American dollars. And my arm."

"Th-that… that would be a big help, yes…." the small man's eyes went round behind his spectacles.

"Then we are agreed."

* * *

No one answered when Ayame knocked on Maria's cabin door. After a moment, she knocked again, a bit louder, and called Maria's name through the door. Still no answer came. She might have let the girl be, believing her simply to want privacy. She had, after all, just lost everything for the second time in her life. But part of Ayame worried that perhaps something had happened in the past hour. The ship had only just weighed anchor, a bit late in departing, and she felt guilty for leaving the girl alone when someone might still have boarded after her. But the girl had requested privacy.

And Ayame, too worried to do otherwise, would break it now.

Maria's cabin door was locked. Ayame, having paid for both cabins, had the key to both cabins. She prayed the girl was safely inside hers as she turned the key.

Ayame paused at what she saw.

The cold, heartless killer was curled on the bed, her arms wrapped around her pillow, asleep.

Her face was peaceful, lacking the hard glare and tightly thinned lips that usually comprised her entire expression. Her short blonde hair was splayed across the pillow, thin swaths over her eyes, as if she'd been tossed onto the bed like a rag doll. She clung to the pillow as if it were a child's favourite stuffed toy. Her cheeks were flushed with the memory of tears, but her eyelashes were dry. She was wearing her blouse, pants and socks. Her coat, jacket and gloves lay in a pile near the mirror. Her boots were toppled at the side of her bed as if she'd kicked them off in her sleep.

Ayame sat gently on the edge of the bed, feeling almost maternal. She laid a hand on Maria's shoulder. "Maria… Maria."

She woke with a start – sitting bolt upright and whipping her gun – which had been in her hand under her pillow – to bear almost pressed between the eyes of the intruder, her bleary and nightmare-ridden unconsciousness slow to leave her. She did not know where she was, nor who was in her cabin. She only managed to call upon the instinctinve reflexes of self-defense and self-preservation.

Ayame was awake, though, and had a soldier's reflexes. She disarmed Maria in the blink of an eye, snatching the gun from her by the barrel, breaking open the breach-loading revolver and dumping five bullets onto the blankets between them.

Ayame did not look angry at all – only automatic. And Maria looked horrified at what she had almost done.

"S-sorry…" she gasped, drawing her knees up and wrapping her arms around them.

Ayame shook her head dismissively. "It was may fault – I would leave you alone, but I worry."

"Thank you," Maria answered, though it seemed an inane thing to say. It was very novel to have someone be concerned about her.

Ayame took up the bullets and handed them, and the gun, back to Maria. "I… I came to make an additional offer… to you."

Maria's eyes widened almost imperceptibly, she was not certain if she could process any more new information and retain her sanity. Her salvation had not even sunk in yet – which explained the confusion upon waking.

"You are allowed to refuse, of course. We are not so strict a regiment as yours in Russia."

Maria lowered her gaze, wondering precisely how much of her past in Russia this woman had dug up.

"What was your rank… with the Revolutionaries?" Ayame asked.

"Second Lieutenant," Maria answered immediately, automatically, and though she had not uncurled physically, a part of her mind snapped to attention. Maria the soldier. Maria the robot.

Ayame was visibly impressed. "An officer. Excellent. To the Imperial Assault Unit, I am Vice Commander. Above me is General Yoneda. Our financial support is Count Hanakoji."

"And I, Vice Commander?"

"That is the offer I have. We have now four enlisted women, including you. And they need a Captain."

"…captain?" the Russian whispered, stunned. Yuri's title. Was this not his dream for her? "Your second in command?"

"No," Ayame shook her head. "I am General Yoneda's second. You will be no one's second. You alone will be a sort of field commander for the girls. You have the military background, the strategy, the tactics. You've given orders before, correct?"

"Yes, but—"

"Don't answer now," Ayame lifted a hand to stop Maria's protest. "Think about it for as long as you need. But you truly are by far the most qualified. We would fall back, if you refused, upon Kirishima Kanna, the karate expert. But she is… far too passionate. I do not believe you suffer from impetuosity," Ayame smiled.

_Quite the opposite,_ Maria thought, _I suffer from hesitance._

"Other than stunned," Ayame's voice softened in deference to the delicate nature of the new subject she was broaching, "how are you?"

"Fine, Vice Commander," she answered as if she'd been asked her opinion of the accomodations provided to her. "Thank you."

"Fine?" Ayame's brows lifted. "If that is so, you are the strongest person alive. Or the most unfortunate."

"Vice Commander?"

"Let me explain our… weaponry… to you, Maria. You will be the pilot… of your own Koubu. A Koubu is nearly a robot – large as three steam automobiles. It is powered by steam… and… by you."

Maria looked perplexed.

"Those with extraordinarily strong… spirits… can _will_ the Koubu to move, to obey their commands. You must open your spirit, Maria, to access the power you have within. So I ask you again, Maria. How are you? Are you open? Or are you locked down?"

"I do not understand, Vice Commander."

Ayame pursed her lips, gentled her voice. "What does your heart tell you?"

"What do you mean, Vice Commander?"

Now fully tired of the robotic responses, Ayame snapped, "Maria, I did not call you to attention, please stop addressing me like I did. I am asking you the nature of your spirit, your heart, your emotions."

Maria stared at her. Questions like these were not asked of her.

"I will order you to respond if you do not."

"What do you want me to say?" Maria asked.

"It doesn't matter what I _want_ you to say, Maria! I want you to tell me what _you_ want to say!"

"I have nothing to say." The placidity of the icy surface of the lake that was Maria's soul was unbroken.

"If you have no answer to the question of the content of your heart, then we have chosen poorly. You would be a failure as a soldier in the Imperial Assault Unit. You wouldn't be able to move the weaponry. You would ruin us."

Maria glared, having been insulted and then told she would fail at something she had not yet been given a chance to try.

"There – what are you feeling?" Ayame opened her hands, almost imploring the girl to show _something_… _anything_…

Maria tried to imagine what Ayame would want to hear, trying to summon some phrase, something to fake, something to pretend, something to appease her – as if she were acting. "I don't underst—"

"Don't understand! Just tell me!" Ayame's voice grew louder, leaning forward on the support of her hands, crowding Maria back against the corner of the walls, causing the girl to curl tighter in a protective ball, but giving her nowhere to run, and nowhere to hide.

"Tell you what—?"

"What do you feel? What hurt you, Maria? What is your past? What do you dream? Tell me!"

Maria flinched against the onslaught, her eyes closing. "I do not h—"

"Look at me!" Ayame lifted Maria's chin with a hand and Maria tried to pull her head away. "I order you to look at me!"

Maria obeyed, but walls of furious ice slammed into place behind her narrowed eyes.

"Have you been hurt, Maria? Answer!"

"Yes, Vice Commander!" Maria growled.

"Attention!" Ayame barked, and Maria scrambled, standing beside her bed at attention, and Ayame stood to join her, looking up at the taller girl. Maria's gaze was fixed, straight forward over Ayame's head. "Look at me!" and Maria did. "Answer me now, what is in your heart?"

Maria's mouth opened, but she faltered, still not understanding the desired response.

"You said you were hurt, Maria, so is there pain?"

"Yes, Vice Commander!" she'd been cued and she responded.

"Stop telling me what you think I want to hear! Tell me what you know is true! Maria Tachibana! What is left in your heart?"

"Nothing, Vice Commander!" Maria's voice broke over the yelled response, but it was the first response she'd given that Ayame did not feed to her first.

Ayame paused a moment, observing the girl, now trembling at attention, holding herself together with every ounce of her strength. A bit more gently, she continued. "Who do you have left, Maria? Anyone?"

"No, Vice Commander!"

"What are your dreams? Are they still alive? Do you remember being a child, Maria? Were you ever a child, Maria?"

"No, V—"

"What was your future with the Mafia? They were trying to kill you! And what did you think Valentinov would d—"

"Leave me alone, please!" Maria squeezed her eyes closed and covered her ears with her hands.

Ayame reached up and yanked Maria's hands away from her ears. Gently, she responded, "You _were_ alone, Maria…"

Unshed tears gleamed on Maria's eyelashes, her jaw gritted resolutely.

"You lost your parents… you watched your lover die in battle… is that correct?" Ayame did not release Maria's hands, and the ungloved, icy cold fingers tightened around hers, clinging to something instinctively – like a baby's hand closes around the fingers which touch its palms – even though her mind told her not to hold on to anything at all.

Maria's voice was a whisper. "Yes, Vice Commander."

Ayame nodded and released Maria. "In that… you are not alone. I watched the man I loved die in battle as well. …in the very battle I ask your help in winning."

Maria blinked in surprise. Ayame turned aside and waved her off. "At ease." Maria did not move. She wanted to apologize, or to say something to the officer who had saved her life, and was attempting to save her soul. But she could think of nothing.

"So you see, Maria… there _is_ someone who understands you. Someone who knows how much you probably want to die. But let me be your evidence that there can be life, still." Ayame turned back to look at Maria. "Tell me your story, Maria. And I promise you… I will tell you all of mine. Then neither of us will be alone."

"My story?" softly Maria responded, then sat again on the edge of the bed after Ayame had done the same. Ayame made note of Maria's subconscious obedience, doing only what was ordered to her, or shown to her, speaking only when asked, very diplomatic, very soldierlike… and very dangerous. Ayame would release her from these chains, or she could not be a leader. It would take time to heal this broken girl, but she would succeed.

"Yes, your story. Who are you? What has happened to you? Where has life taken you, and where will you take life? What are your dreams, what do you love? What do you fear?"

Maria curled back against the wall again, drawing her legs up and wrapping her arms around her bent knees. "All of those things?"

Ayame nodded. "I will keep your secrets – and I will even give you mine as proof of my trust. And I expect you to keep them, too."

Maria exhaled and looked down, shifting slightly as if she were as physically uncomfortable as she was emotionally uncomfortable – as if she had longer limbs than she knew what to do with, slouching and curling to hide any bit of her she deemed was extraneous. The physicality was a mirror of the contortions her soul was performing, a control Ayame noted she would later need and put to excellent use inside a Koubu. Maria began simply, softly. "Was born on nineteen of June, 1903, in Kiev…"

* * *

Three weeks of travel were spent with Ayame paying Maria back for the favour of her confidence by answering every question Maria had about the army, her duties as Captain (she had finally accepted the position), teaching her a greater fluency in Japanese, and explaining the need for secrecy and a cover… as a theatre troupe.

"…Imperial _Theatre_?"

Ayame nodded as the steam powered automobile rolled to a stop in front of the headquarters of the Capital's Imperial Assault Unit. "You did say you can sing, right?"

Maria was white with terror. The stage! She stepped out of the cab and the driver got the brand new suitcase out of the trunk (Ayame had provided for Maria to buy some necessities from the ship and from Calais when they'd stopped there.)

"Come inside," Ayame smiled. "I will explain."

* * *

"…and the current production is _Romeo and Juliet_," Ayame continued explaining as she lead Maria upstairs inside the theatre, to a wing of offices. "I am hoping you will consent to play the role of Romeo."

Maria halted as Ayame was about to open the door of the first office. "…Romeo?"

Ayame nodded, smiling secretly as she noticed that Maria was intrigued. Then she pulled open the door and gestured for Maria to precede her inside.

Behind a desk sat an old man with round spectacles perched on his nose. Three girls sat in the chairs before his desk, but they stood and turned to face her when she entered. A dark-skinned girl with a tousled shock of red hair – taller even than Maria, and looked to be twice as strong – grinned broadly.

Ayame indicated her. "Kirishima Kanna."

A beautiful young woman, diminutive, with expertly groomed hair and perfectly painted makeup folded her arms and smiled elusively. Her purple silk dress hung nearly off her delicate shoulders and draped to just above her toes. "Kanzaki Sumire," Ayame said.

A very small girl, fair and obviously a Westerner like Maria, clung more tightly to a large stuffed teddy bear, blushing shyly and burying her face up to the nose in the bear – large blue eyes peering up at the tall and intimidating Russian woman over the brown fuzzy bear head. "Iris Chateaubriand."

"And of course," Ayame gestured to the man seated at the desk, "General Ikki Yoneda."

Maria took one step forward, rigidly at attention. She'd met each of the girl's gazes stonily as they were introduced to her, but now her eyes were fixed over the seated General's head. And Ayame introduced her.

"This is Maria Tachibana."

"Captain," the girls said, saluting her. Maria was encased in enough ice to accept the respect despite how strongly she wanted to flee, and how uncomfortable she felt.

General Yoneda stood and saluted Maria as well, and she returned the gesture.

"Reporting for duty, Commander," she whispered, her cold, low voice the Hanagumi's first impression of their new captain.

"At ease, Captain."

Maria dropped her hands, and her gaze, meeting the General's eyes.

Then Yoneda smiled gently, his eyes gleaming and creasing at the corners. "Welcome home, Maria."

* * *

THE END

* * *


End file.
